Our Home
by Little Mockingjay
Summary: Two years after the show, the twins return to Gravity Falls with great news: they're there to stay. What has everyone been up to in the past couple of years? What's changed? What hasn't? And most importantly, what new secrets are waiting to be discovered? Dipifica.
1. The Choice

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Gravity Falls.

 **Prologue: The Choice**

Joe was looking over a familiar pink scrapbook covered with drawings and stickers. The stories his kids had told him that September had been fascinating and, he thought with a smirk to himself, their faces when he and Kristen had revealed how much they knew were pretty funny.

Joseph Pines was a tall, thin man who bore an almost striking resemblance to his son, especially now that said son was older; he and his sister had just turned fifteen a few days ago. His wife, Kristen, was a bit shorter with blond hair, and when she smiled, one could easily see the resemblance she held with her daughter in that respect. In Joe's option, even well into their thirties, there was no lovelier woman anywhere.

He flipped to a random page, seeing three familiar faces, and one not so familiar, in a large photo. The man he would know anywhere as he favorite uncle gave him that old, sly grin while he ruffled twelve-year-old Dipper's hair. The look on their son's face always made Joe and Kristen smile. He looked so happy, so comfortable. It had been years, at the time, that either had seen a smile like that on Dipper's face. Now, two years later, he still lite up when he talked about Gravity Falls.

Twelve-year-old Mabel had a huge grin on her face while she hugged her brother. Much like the smile on Dipper's face, that wasn't something either parent had seen between their kids in years at that point. It wasn't that Dipper and Mabel were ever distant or fought often; they had always gotten along and were practically born loyal to each other. Simply that they rarely did things together, let alone hugged unless being made to. It had been a lovey surprise to see how close they'd grown over that summer.

The unfamiliar man was what he still had trouble wrapping his mind around. Growing up, Joe had only vaguely heard a few times that Uncle Stan had been born with a twin brother, who had died in a car crash when Joe was still small. Than the kids come back with tales of portals, journals and a very silly feud. Joe wasn't stupid. He knew quite well about the oddities Gravity Falls contained. He had spent several of his own summers there, after all.

Unfortunately, another summer was coming to a close. The news that Stan was leaving Gravity Falls for a while was what really influenced their choice to keep the kids down here for the past two summers. The first time, they had taken the news about as well as Joe had expected. Mabel had pouted for a day or two but got over it, saying that there was always next year. Dipper just shut himself in his room for a couple of weeks, acting like he'd been betrayed. That boy was definitely a teenager. This passed summer, things seemed to return to what they'd been for years; Mabel always out with friends and Dipper staying in his room with his books and video games. It was great that they loved the place so much, but neither Joe nor Kristen felt comfortable leaving their kids in the custody of people they themselves didn't know. But if they all went...

"Hey, babe." Kristen's voice made him jump slightly. She walked over to the couch and sat beside him, placing two mugs of hot chocolate on the coffee table in front of them. Aside from their daughter's pig, who was sleeping soundly on a chair, they were alone. "I'm done with the lesson plans. Did we make a decision yet?" she asked, taking a sip form her cup.

"I think it might be a good idea." Joe smiled, taking his own mug. "I loved Gravity Falls as a kid, and Dipper and Mabel would love it if we did, especially Dipper."

"And your job?" Kristen asked. "We only have so much rainy day money."

"No one's looking for a new software programmer down here." Joe said. The company he'd worked for had merged with a bigger corporation and they had had to let go of more than one employee. This was about a week ago. "I think it might be time to leave." He paused and looked at his wife. "You sure you're okay with this?"

"Joe, do you remember when we were seventeen, and you dragged me up to Gravity Falls for the summer?" she asked, smiling.

"No, actually." Joe said with a teasing look on his face as he pulled her to him. She rested her head on his shoulder. "I do remember, though, how you invited yourself along for the trip. Always headstrong."

"Those dates..." she sighed wistfully, ignoring the accusation. "that's when I realized I love you."

"So...you're really okay with it?" Joe asked, placing a gentle kiss on his wife's head. She hummed a yes. "The kids'll be happy to hear it. School doesn't start for a couple more weeks, you can go teach at the high-school, and..."

"Joey?" Kristen interrupted, looking and sounding half-asleep. "It's midnight. How about we save it for tomorrow?"

* * *

Okay, this is an ambitious project. An actual story that spans more than a few chapters. Oh man, my ADD's gonna hate this. Review.


	2. Old Friends, New Lives

**Chapter One: Old Friends, New Lives**

As it turned out, it was a mistake to mention this to Dipper and Mabel. Since that morning a week ago, it was all either of them ever talked about.

Mabel had her share of friends back in California who she would miss, but by her own admission, no one she loved as much as her friends in Gravity Falls. Dipper had made an effort to socialize for a while after they returned home, much to Joe and Kristen's pride, but no one wanted anything to do with him so he remained something of a loner and was very eager to return to Gravity Falls. At least it was peaceful now in the car, if only because the kids had fallen asleep. Joe had forgotten how long a drive it was. Once they arrived in town, it didn't take long to find their new home; a light blue, two story house.

"What do you say?" Kristen sighed, as if in defeat. "Wanna wake them up?"

"Sure." Joe also sighed, smirking. "We're gonna have to do it sooner or later." A sudden drumming sound got their attention and looking in the backseat, they spotted a redheaded girl outside, lightly beating on a window and looking very excited.

Joe got out of the car and began scolding her. "Excuse me - "

"WENDY!" Dipper and Mabel yelled, now wide awake and they piled out of the car and into the girl's arms.

"What's up, guys?" Wendy asked, hugging them tightly. Aside from having filled out a bit more and becoming less lanky, she hadn't seemed to have changed at all from the last time they saw her. While Dipper took in the changes, he felt quite pleased that she no longer stirred certain feelings in him. Truth be told, he had been nervous about seeing her again, but now he knew it was all for nothing; his crush was finally gone.

"Mabel!" Mabel turned around to see Candy, Grenda, and a third girl who seemed familiar, but she didn't recognize, who were running up to them. The new girl stopped a few feet away while Candy and Grenda tackled Mabel, squealing out 'I missed you's and 'how have you been's.

"Hey," Dipper called, which got the girls' attention. "I'm here, too."

And with a cry of "Dipper!", the boy was instantly swamped by the three girls and he had to struggle to free himself.

"How long are you in town?" Candy asked. She was thin and tall, but it was still clearly Candy. Grenda was a bit taller and less round as well, though still thickset, her hair was longer and down and she wore earrings. The new girl still looked familiar, but neither Dipper or Mabel could place it; the only girl either of them knew with bleach-blond hair was Pacifica, who would never be caught dead wearing jeans and sneakers.

"Forever!" Mabel shouted in joy. For her part, Mabel had gotten her braces off last year, her hair was shorter and now it seemed as though the sweater she was wearing – red with a kitten showing it's paws – actually fit her. "We're moving up here!"

Candy, Grenda and Wendy screamed and the Pines twins found themselves in the center of a group hug. Wendy had one arm slung around each of their necks, Candy and Grenda encased Mable and the blond girl clung to Dipper, who's face took on a reddish color.

"You have to come over before school starts!" Candy said, continuing to squeeze Mabel.

"Oh, I will." Mabel promised with a wide grin on her face.

"Uh..." Dipper's voice cracked as the hug ended, and his eyes were focused on the new girl. "Have we met?"

The girl gave him a sarcastic look, which made her all the more familiar to both twins. She scoffed playfully, and her voice finally revealed her identity. "There's no way I've changed that much! And you call yourself a detective."

"Pacifica!" Mabel beamed and tackled the other girl with her own hug. Even more surprising than Pacifica actually returning the hug, with no hint of annoyance, was what she was wearing. Along with the jeans and sneakers was a simple hot-pink shirt, and not one accessory or piece of jewelry to be found.

"You look...uh..." Dipper trailed off, finding himself strangely unable to form a coherent sentence as he took in how different she looked without her customary five pounds of make-up.

"Oh, yeah." Pacifica shrugged. "We can't afford designer clothes anymore. I got these at a public store. They're actually pretty comfortable." she said, once again not showing a hint of the distaste she would have expressed quite loudly a couple of years ago.

"And the hair?" Mabel asked. Pacifica's hair now ended a little past her shoulders and looked more natural and certainly healthier.

"I stopped bleaching." she said. "It turns out it's not good for my hair, and Wendy and Tamby helped me treat it." Pacifica paused as Wendy ruffled her hair, which was surprisingly met with a fond grin from her.

"I-it, uh...looks good." Dipper finally manged, his face heating up. Pacifica glanced away smiling shyly, her own cheeks turning a faint pink. Aside from a change of clothes and having gotten a fair bit taller, there was nothing new about Dipper's appearance, but she couldn't shake the thought that there was something more...appealing about him now.

"Jeez, Dipper," Wendy smirked, her eyes flitting between the two. "don't slip in your own drool, there." Dipper and Pacifica's blushes deepened as the four other girls tried and failed to suppress their giggling.

"Uh-okay, subject change." Dipper demanded, being sure to keep his eyes averted from Pacifica, as she occasionally snuck quick glaces at him.

"Alright." Wendy relented. "I still stop by the shack every once in a while."

"The Mystery Shack?" Mabel asked, beaming. "How is it?"

"Actually better than it was. Soos is a pretty good manager, even if the upstairs smells like old lady now. Finally got that stupid 'S' fixed." She rolled her eyes. "Oh, and we get postcards sometimes from Stan and Ford."

"Are they still on their trip?" Dipper asked.

"As far as I know." Wendy said, a somewhat wistful smile appearing on her face. "It'd be nice to see those old cranks again, especially with you two moving up here."

Mabel gasped, Wendy having given her an idea. "Dipper, we should totally get a hold of them!"

"Sounds great." Dipper smiled and turned back to Wendy. "Wendy, do you know how to contact them?"

"I don't, but I think Soos might." she said.

"Race ya to the shack!" Mabel declared, and took off before her brother could even process the challenge.

"Hey, that's cheating!" Dipper called, smiling as he ran after her.

The four girls watched the pair as they disappeared. Wendy pulled her phone out of her pocket and dialed the number for the Mystery Shack, the dial tone ranging a couple of times before picking up. "Hey Melody, it's Wendy. I need to talk to Soos. Sure, I'll hold...Hey, Soos! Guess who just came back to town!...Close."

Dipper and Mabel's hearts pounded with excitement as they came to the familiar pine forest and started weaving through the trees. It wasn't too far into the woods that Jeff the gnome appeared to be chasing squirrels, saw the two, and promptly ducked to the ground.

"Hi, Jeff!" Mabel called as she leaped over him.

"What's up, Jeff?" Dipper asked as he raced passed him a few seconds later.

"Nice to see you guys, too." Jeff called to them, but was clearly aggravated by the interruption.

"Second born, second place!" Mabel yelled tauntingly.

"Not for long!" Dipper called, and indeed he was catching up to her just as the shack came into view. The place did look a lot better. Broken or weak wood was replaced, what appeared to be a fresh paint-job, and, as Wendy had said, the 'S' in 'shack' was where it belonged on the roof.

Out front stood Soos and Melody, neither of whom seemed to have changed at all in the past two years. Melody wore a uniform like Soos had worn before with tanned shorts and a teal shirt with a question mark, and Soos in what the kids assumed was his Mr. Mystery outfit.

"Dudes!" Soos called and spread his arms out for them.

"Soos!" the twins exclaimed happily as they barreled into him and he hugged them tightly.

"Wendy just called, she said you guys were back!" Soos said.

"For good!" Mabel beamed up at him.

"Our parents are moving up here. We've got a house in town." Dipper explained excitedly.

"Awesome!" Soos exclaimed. "Hey, like the Shack's new look? Just repainted last month."

"Looks great, Soos!" Mabel said.

"Hey, want the grand tour?" Soos asked.

"Sure." Dipper answered, only just realizing something amusing; despite having lived here for two months before, neither he nor Mabel had ever been on the tour.

The inside of the shack was just like the outside; much cleaner and safer-looking, again with fresh paint. Still, it was almost like coming home, with the exception of the first stop on the tour; a crudely made statue of their Grunkle Stan, with the word 'founder' under him.

"Here, we have the founder of our fair shack; the original Mr. Mystery, Stanley Pines." Soos rattled off, and it was clear that he said this every day and was happy for it. He looked proudly at the fez on his head.

"Cold, crude and kinda ugly." Dipper said with a grin.

"It's so lifelike!" Mabel praised, and the kids laughed as they followed Soos to the other attractions.

The whole tour lasted about half an hour and was full of laughs and jokes. As the tour ended, Soos lead the twins into a familiar room, with Melody at the cash register. "This concludes our tour of the amazing Mystery Shack. Please stop by the gift shop on your way out." Soos smiled, looking quite pleased with himself, but was called away by the phone which rang from another room.

"Any more grappling hooks?" Mabel asked as she rummaged through the barrels of the gift shop. "Mom took mine away after I broke a window with it."

Dipper chuckled at this, and he was glad to see the pine tree hats were still in stock. He loved the hat Wendy had given him, but he rarely actually wore it anymore. He'd worn it his first day at school after his summer here, and his old bullies had ambushed him and tried to flush it in a toilet. Hence, he kept it at home to keep anything from happening to it. Besides, it just wasn't the same as his old pine tree hat. He presented the hat to Melody, beside the grappling hook Mabel had found and was practically jumping for joy for.

"Hi, kids." Melody greeted as she rang the items up.

"Hi, Melody." Mabel returned, watching her grappling hook like a cat watches a mouse.

"Ma'am." Dipper greeted while they payed the five dollars for the hat and the twenty for the grappling hook. When Melody bagged the items, Dipper took his new hat from the bag and imminently set it on his head.

"How do I look?" Dipper asked, puffing out his chest and acting playfully proud.

"Like an obsessed dork." Mabel teased before slinging her arm around her brother's shoulders and hugging him. "And I wouldn't have ya any other way." Melody smiled at the display of affection.

"Hey, dudes." Soos called, popping his head into the gift shop. "That was your mom on the phone. She says it's time for dinner and wants ya home."

"Oh." Dipper looked out the window, seeing that the sun was getting low. He'd forgotten about their parents and the move. "Yeah we better get going."

"Hey, you guys come back soon, okay." Soos said.

"You bet." Mabel said. "It'd be a great excuse to avoid helping with unpacking."

"See ya in a few days, Soos!" Dipper said. Almost as soon as the door opened, he bolted back in the direction they came, calling; "Beat you home!"

"Not if I can help it!" Mabel yelled and chased after him.

* * *

Yow! The power of friggin' summaries, I guess. I don't think I've ever gotten a reception like that. I'll try to get these out bi-weekly. The only reason I've got this out so soon is because the last chapter was just a prologue, so it doesn't count. Oh, and just so ya know, this thing is seeing the kids through a year here. Review!


	3. Back To The Falls

**Chapter Two: **Back To The Falls****

It had been three days since the move and everything was already unpacked back home. Apparently, Dipper and Mabel's punishment for ditching their parents after five seconds was that they were stuck at home to help with unpacking in anyway they could while their parents saw about employment in town. At least thanks to that, Mabel had been able to better hide her new grappling hook from them, but all that was over and school was only a few days away, which meant one thing for Dipper and Mabel; hard core adventure.

"Alright, no more journals can only mean one thing today." Dipper said, walking confidently into those familiar woods, followed by Mabel. In his backpack was an assortment of items such a rope, a first-aid kit, his own, mostly blank journal, a packet of new pens, and a sack-lunch each.

"Wingin' it?" Mabel asked, holding a camera and eyes glittering with excitement.

"Wingin' it." he confirmed.

"This is gonna be so cool!" Mabel said with an excited hop. "What're we looking for?"

"Anything out of the ordinary." Dipper answered. As he took out his journal and a pen, looking ready for anything. Dipper's journal was blue with a golden pine tree in the center – as the six-fingered hand had been on Ford's old journals. It had been a birthday present from Stan and Ford, as had been Mabel's camera, which she clutched happily and was ready to snap anything. Only a few of Dipper's pages were filled in, having served as a short-lived diary for maybe a month after they got home. Dipper had chosen to preserve it for if they ever had the chance to return to Gravity Falls.

The pair's optimism slowly waned over the next hour or so, as nothing seemed to be going on today. Eventually, they made it out of the woods and to the edge of the lake. Across from them, the cliffs overlooked the town and the falls fed into the lake.

"Good a place as any to stop for lunch." Mabel said, plopping down on a rock and taking her lunch out of Dipper's backpack. Dipper, not really seeing any reason not to, took off the backpack and followed suit after putting the journal and camera away. About mid-way into their meal, something finally happened. A loud screech filled the air as Mabel took out an apple, and she screamed as she was suddenly dove at by what looked like...

"Giant bat!" she screamed as the thing landed before her and tried to snatch it out of her hand.

"It's okay!" Dipper called to her. "It's a fruit bat! All it wants is the apple!"

"No, it's mine!" Mabel said, holding the apple in one hand and her other pressing on the bat's the furry neck, keeping the fruit out of the reach of it's snapping jaws. She yelped as the thing scratched her across the face and the impact pushed her to the ground, but she refused to let go of the apple.

"Give it up, Mabel!" Dipper yelled, getting up behind the bat and trying to pull it off of her. It began flapping it's massive wings and fluttered maybe a foot off the ground. Dipper wished he had a taser right now. "It'll go away if it gets the apple!"

"Dipper!" Mabel whined, still refusing to let go of the fruit when the bat took a hold of it with a clawed foot. It was her lunch, and her's alone.

"Mabel!" Dipper shot back, wondering when exactly she'd become so stubborn.

They both found themselves hanging on tight, though, as the bat flew higher, taking them with it to the very center of the lake, too far out to swim back on their own. Somehow, they ended up like this: The fruit bat had the apple in his mouth and was trying to shake off Mabel, who was dangling by one hand from the apple, the other holding Dipper who'd slipped off the bat's back. The bat won; he shook off the pesky humans and devoured his prize as they screamed, plummeting into the lake with a loud splash.

The cool water surrounded them and while Dipper's vision was blurry, he quickly found Mabel, as she did him, and they swam towards each other, clasping their hands. Thankfully, they weren't too far from the surface, just upwards a few feet.

The fall must have knocked air out of them because they were already running out of breath. Dipper's mind went into a panic as he frantically tried to make the surface. Mabel went along with it, but she could have sworn she heard something weird. It sounded like a mixture between laughter and a horses' neigh. Neither of them noticed the water pulling away from them until a bubble of air was formed around them; not even their clothes were wet. Dipper gasped and they both broke out into coughing fits.

"What happened?" Dipper asked when his coughing subsided enough. He and Mabel looked around in wonder; they were at the bottom of the lake. The muddy ground, the underwater plants, the small schools of fish.

"It's a bubble." Mabel said slowly.

"Hello." a warbling voice said, sounding strangely clear underwater. Whatever those things were in the distance, they were coming closer. As the figures came closer, they revealed themselves as large seahorse-type creatures. They looked like horses, but their whole backsides were large fish-like tails and in place of hooves were smaller fins at the ends of their legs. Taking a closer look, one was shimmering bright pink with a blue mane that flouted everywhere like hair underwater. Another appeared to be white based on how the scales subtly changed with surrounding colors, with a mane of bright yellow. The final creature was deep blue so that it almost blended into the water, and it's dark green mane looked like seaweed.

"Hippocampai?" Dipper questioned, his eyes widening in wonder.

"They're like merhorses..." Mabel sounded hypnotized and soon she had a huge smile on her face and stars in her eyes.

"It appears we have visitors." the white one warbled in a sweet voice.

"How did you land-dwellers get down here?" the blue one asked.

"Coral, don't be rude." the pink one scolded. "Hello, there. My name is Shelly. This are Rain and Coral. Yourselves?"

"Uh...I'm Dipper." Dipper said uncertainly. "This is my sister Mabel. We were dropped by a giant fruit bat." he said, only just realizing how bizarre that sounded.

"Well, this is no place for you two." Rain said. "You'd run out of air within a minute. Just a moment, friends. Coral, do you mind?"

Rain and Coral bowed their heads and touched their muzzles to the bubble, lifting it. The bubble was somehow solid enough to keep the water away from Dipper and Mabel. The seahorses took them to the surface and the bubble dismantled in the air. A pair of muzzles pushed the kids onto land – they were back at the edge of the lake.

"Are you alright, Dipper and Mabel?" Shelly asked.

"Yeah, we're fine." Mabel said.

"Thanks a bunch." Dipper said, getting back to his feet, reclaiming his forgotten backpack and thinking maybe it would be smart to make a map in the future.

"If you need us again, you can call us." Coral said as Rain ducked down into the water and popped back up a moment later, propelling herself fully out of the water, and smacking something with her tail, which Mabel caught. It was a small seashell.

The kids looked at the shell for a moment before Mabel put it in her pants pocket. They looked back in sync at the lake, seeing only three sets of ripples in the lake, but no seahorse things. Dipper sat down and immediately took out his journal and a pen, jotting down all he could remember about the encounter.

"You okay, Mabel?" he asked as he got up and they set off for home. He eyed the long scratches on her cheek. "That bat really got you good."

"I'm fine, but I don't think we can hide this from Mom and Dad." Mabel said, looking nervous.

"Won't that be fun?" Dipper rolled his eyes, not looking foreword to it. Would they understand? Would they forbid them coming out here again. He hoped not. Didn't his dad say that he came here as a kid, too? Maybe he'd be able to convince them it was safe, but how could he do that with his sister's cheek all scratched up? Dipper spent the whole trip home torturing himself with thoughts like these.

"Ow! Owowowow!" Mabel's voice came from the kitchen. Dipper sat on the couch in the living room with Kristen, trying to calm himself down from those thoughts.

"Mabel, you're fifteen; quite being a baby." Joe's voice said, also coming from the kitchen.

"It burns!" she whined.

"And was this worth it for an apple?" her father asked.

"...No." she said, sounding defeated.

"Alright, you're done." he said. "Now come into the living room. We need to talk about this."

Dipper's fists tightened in his lap. His parents would never allow this! He forced himself to calm down when his sister and their father came into the room. Mabel sat beside him, a bandage on her cheek with a smear of faded pink under it. When Joe looked at him, Dipper refused to let the silence build; there was too much on the line.

"Dad, it was a fluke." he said out of nowhere just as Joe sat down.

"Dipper –" he started.

"It's not dangerous!" Dipper carried on, speaking over him.

"Dipper." he repeated.

"It's fascinating out there!" Dipper went on. "This is why we love it here! There's all these creatures, adventures and amazing –"

"Dipper!" Joe shouted, finally silencing his son. "Listen." Dipper finally calmed down, but still felt very nervous. "Remember, your mother and I know everything. The weird things, the bizarre creatures, everything." Dipper held his breath. " Now, we'll let you keep exploring or do whatever you were doing."

"Yes!" Mabel cheered, and Dipper let go of his breath in relief.

"Hold it." Kristen said. "We're setting some ground-rules, though."

Neither of the kids protested, they simply looked at their parents silently; this would be worth-it if it meant they would be allowed to continue exploring the town's secrets and not have to lie to their parents about it.

"First," Kristen said. "school's starting in a couple of days. No exploration on school nights; no exceptions."

"Second," Joe continued. "one of you gets hurt like this again, and your both in for the night."

"Finally," Kristen said. "if anything important happens, tell us. We're not going to be kept in the dark while our kids are in trouble."

"Okay." Dipper and Mabel nodded together.

"Alright." Joe said. "It's late. No more exploring for today."

"Hey, did you guys get your jobs today?" Dipper asked, eager to get away from the subject before it was put into jeopardy again.

"I got a job at the high-school. I'm a new English teacher." Kristen smirked at the twins as they looked at each other in horror; they would be starting at that same high school in a few days. There would be no escape.

"And I managed to find a programming job at a reputable place." Joe said. "I start tomorrow."

"Great." Dipper sighed, relieved that at least one of this parents wouldn't also be his teacher. "I'm going upstairs. I need to think about things."

"Dinner's in an hour." his mother called after him.

Dipper passed Mabel's room on his way to his own. It was still covered with posters and stuffed animals, but it wasn't the world of pink one would think. Dipper's own room had a large desk and a bookshelf apart from his other furniture.

The boy collapsed onto his bed and stared at the ceiling. Between the adventure today and the emotional roller-coaster he'd put himself through afterwords, he was completely tiered out. He'd have to make a map, there were seahorse-type things in the lake, and his parents knew about and allowed their expeditions. Dipper Pines loved this place.

* * *

Call upon the sea-ponies, they'll see you to shore~! And I'm on the fence about it, but I'm thinking of having an over-arching story with some otherworldly villain, like the show had with Bill Cipher. Review.


	4. Gravity Falls High

**Chapter Three: Gravity Falls High**

"Well, we managed to avoid him for a week. That's something, right?" Dipper asked, clearly trying to lighten the mood. It was the first day of school, for which even Mabel had been excited. Their mother had offered to drive them and they had declined. They made plans with Wendy to meet up with her and her friends on the way and walk together; a decision they were now regretting.

"I guess." Mabel muttered, looking especially disappointed. Practically floating on the other side of her was Gideon, who was staring at her with a huge, goofy grin, entranced. She groaned. "Gideon, don't you go the middle school?"

"Not if you don't want me to, my peach." Gideon said with a love-sick sigh. He had lost a fair amount of weight since they'd last seen him, and much to Dipper's relief, had cut his hair to look less...unnatural. "Did you get your braces off? Those little peals are just dazzlin'!"

"Gideon!" the twins barked, which seemed to bring the kid down to reality.

"Sorry." Gideon said, looking somewhere between embarrassed and ashamed. At the same time, Wendy and her friends came into view. Despite looking a bit older, nothing had really seemed to change. Robbie's arm was lazily slung around Tambry, as was...Lee's around Wendy?

"Seniors! Seniors! Seniors!" the group chanted before noticing the kids. Mabel perked up and ran to the older teens, leaving the boys in the dust. Gideon's eye twitched, which caused a dreading pit in Dipper's stomach, seeing Robbie, Nate, Lee and Thomson hugging Mabel and greeting her happily. He seemed blind to how Wendy and Tambry were doing the same. Gideon turned on his heel and began stalking away, muttering about having to get to class.

"See ya, Gideon." Dipper called, and he didn't seem to care that he was being ignored as he approached the group himself and was practically yanked into a pile of friendly punches, noogies and hair tousling. While he and Mabel were still a bit shorter than the others and visibly younger, they no longer towered over them.

"What's up, Dipstick?" Robbie asked.

"When were you gonna let us know you were back?" Nate asked.

"Hey, guys." Dipper returned, thinking that this was the first time he could remember ever being greeted by friends on the first day rather than being forced to rescue his hat from bullies.

"You guys ready for _this_ high-school?" Wendy asked, sounding more like she was offering a challenge rather than going to school.

"We've been ready for years." Mabel said, looking ready to meet Wendy's challenge.

"Awesome." Wendy smiled confidently. The rest of the way was spent catching up. Wendy and Lee had started dating a few months ago, Robbie still detested his overly-cheery parents, Tambry had gotten a sleek new phone and Thomson had apparently been arrested over the summer thanks to a dare from Nate; he'd vandalized Sheriff Blubbs' car...while Blubbs was still in it.

To Dipper and Mabel's disappointment, they only shared two of their four classes and their lunch period. They had English and history together. All the awkwardness they imagined from having their own mother being their teacher ensued, with a good portion of the class sneering that they had an unfair advantage over everyone else, while the less mature students laughed at this bit of oddness. The Pines twins would definitely be without friends in this class.

For second period, the twins were separated. Dipper, much to his frustration, had gym class. Still, he was glade to see Wendy and Nate there, who were quick to help him learn the ropes. The bigger downside to this was how Mr. Poolcheck was the gym couch. And he certainly remembered Dipper. Oh boy. On the flip-side, Mabel had art class, at which she'd always flourished, and even shared it with Candy and Grenda.

Third period was advanced science for Dipper, which was simply a haven, and he quickly established himself as the smartest in the class. He hardly even cared when this once again earned him the scorn of his classmates, who called him a geek and a showoff. At this time, Mabel had math, which was nothing special to her aside from being boring. She did notice a strange abundance of cute boys there, though.

Dipper and Mabel had made plans with Wendy and the others about where to meet at lunch on the way to school. Mabel was particularly excited as she gushed over the boys in her math class, Dipper rolling his eyes and taking it in stride; the same stuff he'd heard from her since they were eleven. Nate and Lee had already been given detention for a prank, and Wendy listened, along with Dipper, to Mabel's gushing.

The final class of the day was history, which the twins had together. They were pleased to discover Pacifica was also in this class with them, and surprised to learn that she was even the same year as them. Apparently, her parents had pressured her grades so much in the past, it lead to her skipping fifth-grade. After a brief call to her parents, Pacifica accompanied the twins home after school. Figuring it would be more fun with a friend, Mabel had invited her over for a small study group, which she'd accepted.

"Homework on the first day?" Mabel grumbled a short time later. They were in Dipper's room, reading through their history textbooks. "Are they insane?"

"Agh! I know." Pacifica groaned.

"I don't really mind." Dipper shrugged, breezing through his book and getting envious looks from the girls because of it. He was sitting at his desk by the window, with Mabel and Pacifica stretched out on his bed and sitting on the floor, respectively.

"Mabel, your brother's a nerd." Pacifica told her bluntly.

"I'd say more of a mega-nerd." Mabel smirked, earning the girls a look from Dipper, which they both laughed at.

"Hm. Mega-nerd works, too." Pacifica said, returning Dipper's look with an expression of fake innocence, as if to say 'What? Me?'. Dipper rolled his eyes at this and turned back to his book. After shooting the boy one last look, she turned to Mabel. "Good idea with the study group, though. This _is_ more fun than being at home."

"Hey, I thought your parents didn't like us" Dipper said, looking at her. "You're dad's not gonna, like, send a S.W.A.T team over here, is he?"

"No, all I told them was that I was studying with friends. I don't think they know it's you guys." she said.

"Well," Mabel said, getting up from the bed and stretching. "I'm hungry, so I'm getting a snack. You guys want anything?"

"Nah." Dipper said shortly, not looking away from his book.

"I'm good." Pacifica said, tossing Dipper another look, which he didn't seem to notice this time. Mabel shrugged and left, leaving the two alone. Pacifica knew they should have been studying, but Dipper was being a total killjoy. Maybe she could lighten his mood with a bit of fun.

Dipper felt his hat being taken from his head and turned around to see Pacifica, looking at him teasingly, dangling the hat in her fingers. He made a grab for it, but she jerked it away. The smirk on her face screamed 'come and get it'. He smirked back, deciding to take the bait, just this once. She squealed as he grabbed her free wrist and pulled her to him, reaching for the hat, and she stretched to keep it out of reach.

"Give it up, Northwest." Dipper told her.

"No!" she said, laughing. "You look funny when your flustered."

"Oh, you like funny, huh?" Dipper asked with a laugh. Pacifica gasped when his outstretched hand grabbed her wrist and tried pull it and the hat closer, but Pacifica quickly shifted it to her other hand, again holding it out of his reach. So, it was like that. "Okay, let's go."

"You're not gonna get it, dork!" Pacifica taunted. "Admit defeat now and maybe I'll go easy on y-aah!" she squealed again as he snuck his free hand behind her neck and tickled her there. This yielded the desired result, as Pacifica dropped the hat, which Dipper grabbed and placed back on his head. Deciding that such a thing couldn't go unpunished, Pacifica went for his ribs. As she thought, the boy actually fell onto his bed, but he managed to grab her wrist again, bringing her down with him.

"Who told you about that?" Dipper demanded once he stopped laughing. He'd never told anyone about the weak spot in his ribs.

"Mabel." she smiled down at him, giving him a victorious look.

"That sneaky little traitor." Dipper mumbled to himself, and Pacifica once again plucked his hat from his head. As she placed it on her own head, holding the bill, there was a look of challenge in her eyes. "Oh, you're going down." Dipper said with an excited smirk.

Pacifica yelped as Dipper flipped them over and pushed her onto her back. The hat fell the floor as she tried to push back against him. "Nope!" Dipper laughed, grabbing her wrists and they struggled back and forth. "No, no, no. You're not getting away!" The pair laughed as Dipper managed to pin her wrists down so they were on either side of his pillow.

His...pillow. The laughter died down, replaced with heavy silence as Dipper and Pacifica realized what position they were in. They were on Dipper's bed together. Completely alone. Pacifica was laying on her back with Dipper pinning down by her wrists, and he was hovering directly over her.

They were frozen. His hair was messy, their faces were burning, and their hearts sped up almost together as the deep brown eyes found the bright blue. Neither could tell how long they were like that, but neither could have been bothered to hear the door opening, either. Someone cleared their throat, which snapped Dipper and Pacifica out of their shared trance.

Mabel had returned with a plate of sandwiches, and looked at them blankly. "Am I...interrupting?" she asked, sounding very awkward.

"This isn't...what it looks like?" Dipper half-explained in the same unsure tone. He slowly moved to sit on the side of his bed. Now free, Pacifica got up and sat beside him, her heart still pounding. The two made it a point to avoid eye contact.

"Right..." Mabel said. It was clear she didn't believe a word of it. "So, back to homework."

"Right." Dipper nodded. "Homework."

The rest of the night passed without incident, though Mabel noticed that Dipper and Pacifica refused to look at each other. On the occasion they slipped up on this, their gazes snapped away from each other instantly. This was ultimately why Mabel refrained from pursuing the matter; there was no way she'd get an answer out of either of them...yet.

About an hour later, after Pacifica had gone home and Mabel was probably asleep, Dipper lie on his bed, staring wide-eyed at his ceiling and wondering. What was that?

* * *

There we are, so hopefully, this'll get you shippers to cool it for a bit. Daw, just kidding, I love you guys! Review.


	5. How To Save Your Dragon

**Chapter Four: How To Save Your Dragon**

Bzzzz. Bzzzzz. Bzzzzzzzz.

Mabel yawned as she woke up to the vibration of the phone on her nightstand. The clock next to it read eight in the morning. Morning. She shot up, hurriedly rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Today was Saturday. It was the first weekend after school started, and she and Dipper had been eager to get to the weekend. She grabbed her phone and saw it was a text from Candy.

 _'Mabel. Get Dipper and come over. NOW!'_ Mabel tapped her phone off, stretched as she got up, and went to wake Dipper up.

Dipper yawned as he followed Mabel to Candy's house. "So did Candy say what she needed?"

"Nope." Mabel said. "She just said for us to come over."

"Fantastic." Dipper muttered grouchily, still a bit sleepy. This had better be good. The next few minutes were a bit of a blur to him. They got to Candy's house, Mabel knocked on the door, Candy answered and yanked them into the house, jerking him awake.

"Mornin' Candy." Dipper greeted through a yawn and stretched. He really needed to stop staying up until two in the morning.

"Morning, Dipper. Mabel." she returned, hurriedly leading them to her room.

"Are your parents home?" Mabel asked as Candy seemed to make a point of closing the door behind them.

"No, and that's why we have to hurry." Candy said, taking a tarp off of a large crate. "My parents would freak out if they saw this."

"Saw wha-" Dipper paused as he and Mabel looked into the crate. There was a green lizard-type thing looking up at them with large brown eyes. It was about the size of a cat, sprinkles of blue on it's back, with a pair of small wings and horns on it's head, between it's fin-like ears. "Is that a...dragon?"

"A baby dragon!" Mabel squealed in delight and picked the thing up like it was a puppy. "He's so cute!" Candy smiled.

"I call him Speckles." she said, watching the dragon reach his nose to Mabel to take a sniff. Dipper eyed them and raised on eyebrow.

"You know Mom and Dad are never gonna let you keep that thing." he said. "They barely let you keep Waddles."

"Exactly." Candy told him. "Who knows what they'll do if they find him. I want to make sure he gets home okay."

"Where'd you even find a dragon?" Dipper asked.

"The woods." Candy said. "His paw was hurt, so I brought him back here to take care of the little guy."

"What!?" Dipper yelled. "Haven't you seen every nineties dinosaur movie ever made? That 'little guy's' parents are gonna show up and eat you!"

"I know, but I couldn't leave him." Candy said, giving Dipper a sad look. "I only found him before dinner last night, but I woke up to find his paw was completely healed. He seems to be fine today. Now we just need to find his parents."

"Well, I guess we know what we're doing today." Dipper said to Mabel, who laughed as Speckles tried to eat her hair. "So...anyone know what dragons eat?"

Speckles' ears twitched and he paused his assault on Mabel's hair. Before anyone could question this, he leaped out of her arms and scurried to the window, which was closed. The noise he made was high and whinny.

"I'm sure we'll find out on the way." Candy said, grabbing the dragon and heading out of the room, the twins following her. As soon as they made it outside, Speckles began crying and wiggled his way out of an alarmed Candy's arms. "Speckles!" she called as he ran down the road toward the lake, and the three gave chase.

It took a while, but Candy and the twins eventually got to the lake to find Speckles splashing around in in the shallower part of the water, catching and devouring fish whole. Mabel tapped Dipper on the shoulder, getting his attention. "I think they eat fish." Dipper gave her a lopsided smirk and rolled his eyes.

"Okay, where exactly did you find him?" he asked Candy.

"The edge of the woods, where the cliff is closest to town." she said.

"Alright, I'll bet there are dragons living in the those caves." Dipper said as Speckles, done with his meal, swam towards them. "I've definitely never seen any in the woods."

Speckles emerged from the water and shook himself off like a dog, sprinkling Dipper and the girls with lake water. Mabel picked him back up, but before Dipper could walk five steps toward the cliffs, a kid came out of nowhere and crashed into him, the impact sending them both to the ground.

Dipper shook his head clear and looked at the kid. He noticed something sort of familiar about him, and he silently searched his head for anyone he knew with sandy hair and brown eyes. The kid must have come from the Mystery Shack, by the pine tree hat he was wearing, identical to Dipper's own, so he was probably a tourist. Most curiously, the kid seemed shocked to see him.

"Y-you're D-D-Dipper Pines." the kid said in wonder.

"Yeah, that's me." Dipper said, getting to his feet and helping the boy to his. "You a tourist?"

"You could say that." he said. "I've heard about a lot from you in town."

Dipper laughed bashfully, briefly wondering how this had happened. Had tales of his and his family's adventures reached outside of Gravity Falls? Dipper could have sworn Mayor Cutebiker had said something about not telling out-of-towners about that whole thing. "Yeah, I'm...sort of a hero. Well, more -"

"Stan!" a girl's voice called. She emerged from the woods, and the teenagers' first amused thoughts was that she looked like a younger version of Mabel. She seemed a bit unbalanced to see them, but she still looked at the boy. "Stan, there you are. Chris is looking everywhere for you."

"You're name's Stan?" Dipper asked the kid. "I have an uncle named Stan."

"Cool." the kid said after a moment. The girl was now looking at Mabel, with much the same expression Stan had given Dipper before; a look of aw and slight disbelief. Of course, it might have been the baby dragon she was holding. The girl managed to shake herself awake.

Speckles let out an impatient call, which was this time answered by a fearsome, low growl. Dipper and the girls exchanged alarmed looks; they needed to get going! Dipper turned to the kids. "Well, this has been fun, but we're on a mission."

"To save the town?" Stan asked, looking excited.

"Yep." Dipper grinned at the kid. It looked like he had a fan. "See you around, Stan." he said, and he took of running into the woods, followed by the girls. What none of them heard was Stan muttering that he could pretty much guarantee that.

It took about an hour to get to the cliffs. Dipper seemed to have made the right guess about the caves, because Speckles wiggled out of Mabel's grip and scurried over to a wall. There was an opening a couple of miles upward, which Speckles was trying to jump into, his tiny claws making dirt and dust fall from the cliff wall. He let out a loud whine, and again it was answered with a growl.

Dipper, Mabel and Candy were quick to duck into the woods, watching from a safe distance as a pair of fully grown dragons emerged from the cave and flew to the ground to meet with Speckles, one deep green and of a slimmer build, the other red with an amber underbelly and looking larger and stockier. They weren't so huge like in a lot of books, in which their claws would be as big as a full grown man. The adults were about twice the size of a horse, easily big enough for several people to ride.

The green one nuzzled Speckles as the red one rose it's head and let out a roar so loud that the nearby humans were forced to press their hands to their ears. Dipper made a mental note to come back and study the dragons another time, mentally noting that the roar appeared to be a warning by the dragon to strangers to stay away from it's young.

"You think the town's safe now?" Mabel asked.

"Looks like it." he answered, seeing the adults retreating back into the cave, Speckles riding on the green one's back.

"Bye, Speckles." Candy muttered in a small voice, looking like she might start crying. Mabel hugged her and Dipper gave her a sympathetic look.

"You did the right thing." he told her.

"I know." Candy said, not looking any happier. "But..."

"You know what?" Dipper asked. "I'm gonna come back to study the dragons sometime. You can come with me, if you want. Stop by to vis –"

Dipper didn't get to finish because Candy cut him off with a hug. Dipper gave her a small smile and hugged her back. Mabel embraced Candy from behind and extended her arms around Dipper. They broke the group hug when a stomach growled.

Candy blushed. "Um...How about some lunch?"

* * *

Wow, the writer's block. I don't care what DnD says, everything's better with dragons! Some of them can breathe ice along with fire. Draco, Ice Beam! Haha! Okay, seriously, I'm planting the seeds of an idea in this chapter. If anyone wants a spoiler, check out some of my other stuff. Review.


	6. Games And Missions

**Chapter Five: Games And Missions**

"Didn't you say before that you're goal was to be a regular kid from than on?" Dipper asked, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. "'Cause I think continuing to spy on my sister might be going against that."

"Mm-hm." Gideon hummed absently, giving Dipper the distinct impression that he was being ignored. He was leaning on the fence that surrounded the outside lunch area of the high-school, which also bordered that of the next-door middle-school. Gideon tried, and failed in Dipper's opinion, to hide behind one of several bushes that dotted either side of the fence, eying Mabel like a creep.

His stomach twinging in hunger, Dipper give an aggravated groan to the younger boy. "Ya know what? If you wanna waste your lunch period being creepy than go ahead, but I'm gonna go eat."

The outside area was jam-packed. The autumn weather had set in almost overnight, and everyone was eager to relax out here before it got too cold to eat outside. Apparently it was like that up here in the upper States; there was precious little time of fair weather before it became too hot or too cold, about two months if they were lucky according to Wendy, and so it was only natural that people would be keen to take advantage of the mild climate while they had the chance.

Wendy seemed to know some sort of secret about getting the tables, which were first come first serve, because whoever she was eating with, they seemed to always have one. Today it was her, himself, Mabel, and Pacifica eating at the closest table to the fence. Wendy frequently ate with them, but from the second day of school, it was practically a tradition for Pacifica and the Pines twins to have lunch together every day, seeing as the only real time they spent together during school, they technically weren't supposed to talk.

The twins had abandoned their yet untouched trays back at the table. Mabel, as she did every day, spent a full quarter of lunch period chatting with Candy and Grenda, who were sitting in what little shade a sapling in the school yard offered. Today, Dipper had noticed Gideon in the bushes, spying on his sister. Mabel made it back to the table a minute or two before Dipper, and he imminently started on his taco as he finally sat down.

The table was unusually quiet today; a fact that Mabel refused to stand for. Easy enough, with the information the girls had just given her. She glared at Pacifica as she ate, who poked uninterestedly at her home-brought meal, looking rather lethargic. Rightfully so, in Mabel's opinion. Dipper and Wendy were silent as they gave her sympathetic looks, and she glanced up, locking eyes with Mabel.

Pacifica was silent for a moment, and gave the other girl an unsure "Yes?"

"How old are you?" Mabel asked, looking and sounding very serious. At this, Dipper and Wendy locked eyes themselves, a challenging look in both sets.

"Bet you a pudding cup this is something ridiculous." Wendy smirked as she took the pudding cup from her lunch and set it half way between herself and Dipper.

"Oh, come on, you took the easy one!" Dipper protested.

"Fourteen." Pacifica answered, straightening up and more confused than offended at Mabel's tone. They ignored the other two.

"What's the matter Pines?" Wendy teased. "Afraid to lose a little bet?"

At this, Dipper scowled, grabbed the two small cookies from his own tray, and silently set them beside the pudding cup, forming a small pot of treats.

"Candy and Grenda told me something." Mabel said. "They said you've never been to a slumber party before!" Dipper rolled his eyes as Wendy grinned at herself and moved the pudding and cookies back to her.

"I haven't." Pacifica answered, privately calming down, having feared that something was wrong. "My parents never let me do that in the mansion. I've had friends over for the night, but not –"

"We need to fix that right now!" Mabel declared and she took her phone out to begin dialing her home number.

"But you haven't lived there for over a year." Dipper reasoned.

"Mabel's friends wanted her to be back before they ambushed me about that." Pacifica said, "Said we should all be there or something."

"Mom said yes!" Mabel told them.

"Well, I guess I'm coming over, than." Pacifica shrugged, taking out her own phone and dialing her home number. "Hey, Mom? Hey, I'm sleeping over at a friend's place tonight. That okay?" Pacifica asked, and her face heated up when she glanced at Dipper, who turned red at her wording, and turned away from him. Wendy raised her eyebrows at this little display, unnoticed by either of them as she dunked a cookie into her pudding. "The Pines twins. Yeah, they're back. About a month ago. Yeah, he won't. Alright, thanks. Bye." No sooner than she closed her phone did Mabel tackle her with a hug. Well, this will be fun, Pacifica thought.

"So how mad was your dad?" Mabel asked as the three girls entered her house just as the sun was beginning to set. Joe was working late, Kristen was grading test papers in the kitchen, and Dipper was lounging in the living room.

"Well, I narrowly avoided getting grounded." Pacifica told her. "I think he might still be yelling."

"What's his problem with us?" Dipper asked, getting up and walking to join the girls. "We saved their ungrateful asses twice."

"Dipper, did I just hear you swear?" Kristen's voice called from the kitchen.

"No." he called back.

"You joining us, bro?" Mabel asked, grinning at him.

"No way." he said, trying to avoid looking at Pacifica. "I've got...I...You know what, I just don't want to."

"Killjoy." Mabel muttered as Dipper ascended the stairs to his bedroom, determined to keep his mind straight. Really, it wasn't that Pacifica was even here, it was more that she was sleeping over. The biggest problem with this was actually that incident a couple of weeks back involving the two of them and his hat. And his bed. His face heated up thinking about it. It had given way to her showing up in a couple of his dreams in ways that made him endlessly thankful that he and Mabel had separate rooms. He blamed puberty.

Not five minutes later, the girls were up in Mabel's room, sitting in a circle, all pajama-clad. Pacifica, in cozy pink silk pajamas, sat across from Mabel, who wore an oversized purple shirt with a floppy disk on it. Candy wore a green gown and held one of Mabel's stuffed bears to her. Grenda wore a paler pink pair of pajamas, a green teddy bear and a bag of chips in her arms. The crumbs littered the pages of her mother's book.

As Grenda reached the end of the chapter, Mabel and Candy giggled. Pacifica blushed, knowing for sure they weren't supposed to be doing this. If Mabel's parents caught them with that thing...

"Okay, can...can we take a break from this for a bit?" she stuttered.

"Oh, come on, we're just getting to the good part!" Grenda protested. Seeing Pacifica's discomfort, Mabel decided to take her side on this. Seeing her blush, she had a pretty good idea of what to do next.

"Well, we're doing this for her, Grenda." she said. "Let's pick this up later. Pacifica, have you ever played Truth, Dare or Don't?"

"I've played Truth or Dare." Pacifica said, thinking to herself that the 'don't' kind of defeated the purpose of the first two, but what did she know?

"Alright." Mabel grinned. "Truth, dare, or don't?"

"Truth." Pacifica said, not really thinking of her answer.

"Do you like anyone?" Mabel asked, the other two girls 'ooohh'ing and looking at Pacifica. Dipper immediately jumped to her mind, renewing her lingering blush. Oh no.

"Shut up." Pacifica mumbled with a hint of playfulness, and the other girls squealed as she desperately tried to chase Dipper from her mind. She was pretty sure she didn't talk in her sleep or anything, but just to be safe...

"It's Dipper, isn't it?" Mabel asked.

"I already answered." Pacifica reminded her hastily, Mabel's little question not doing anything for her at the moment.

"Okay, okay." Mabel laughed. The game went on, and to Pacifica's relief, the subject of her liking someone didn't come up again. Unfortunately, the looks Mabel occasionally tossed her said plainly that she hadn't forgotten about it. She'd just have to deal with that as it came.

Hours later, over at was used to be the Northwest Mansion, a scream echoed throughout a room, which was easily big enough for the four people who slept here. McGucket and the girls practically jumped awake at the little boy's scream.

"Stan." the older girl, about sixteen years old, said. She sat up from her spot on the huge, lavish bed and moved over to him on the left end, pulling the kid into a half-hug and looking at him with concern. "You okay?"

"Aw, he's just scared of the ghosts." the younger girl teased, still laying on the far right side of the bed. McGucket stretched out like a cat at the foot of the bed, rubbing his eyes.

"Stanford Tyrone Pines is scared of nothing!" Stan declared, a bit too loudly.

"Liar." the girl said dryly.

"Lay off, Chloe." the older girl said, protectively tightening her arm around Stan. "It's not like we've never been here before, at least back home. It's not even that creepy here."

"You've been here b'fore?" McGucket asked. His interest peeked, the old man clapped loudly twice, and the room light up. It took a moment for everyone to get used to the sudden rush of light.

"Well, our moms were always telling us to never go to the old mansion, so..." Chloe trailed away, noticing the older girl's glare on her. "'Kay, I'll stop."

"Actually," McGucket said, scratching his head and peering a bit closer at each of his guests. "I letcha stay in my shed for the time bein', but I don't know a solitary thing about any of ya? Name's Fiddleford McGucket, local inventor and kook." he grinned, extending his hand in greeting.

"I'm Crystal Pines," the older girl said, hesitating at first, but forced herself to shake his hand. He seemed like a pretty nice guy, and it would have been rude to deny the gesture after all he'd done for them. "everyone just calls me Chris, though. This is my brother Stan and our cousin Chloe."

"Pines, huh?" McGucket asked. "You related to our Pines? They're town heroes, ya know." Now that he thought about it, the kids did look a bit like Dipper and Mabel, especially Chloe. Chris didn't seem to resemble them but he knew he'd seen those same blue eyes somewhere, he just couldn't place it.

Chris covered the kids' mouths before either could say something stupid. Time was of the essence here; no mind games. "McGucket -"

"Fiddleford." the old man insisted, smiling. The gaps left by his missing teeth freaked her out, but she forced herself to keep going.

"Fiddleford." she replied. "It's late, and I promise if we told you everything now, none of us would be able to get back to sleep. We'll tell you everything tomorrow. For now, lets just say there's a reason we came back."

"It wasn't my fault." Stan muttered, glancing away and remembering the nightmare that had woken him up moments ago. He grabbed his sister's hand and she squeezed his reassuringly.

"Was too." Chloe shot back quietly.

"Knock it off, runts." Chris groaned. "It's after midnight and I'm tiered. Your fight can wait until tomorrow."

* * *

Well, I hope I made up for it with Stan. His given name is Stanford, but he goes by Stan. I think it's a fun way to have him named for both the elder Pines twins. Good idea, right? Also, how's that for shipping? Dipper's a dirty little boy. ;) Review.


	7. Northwestern Pines

**Chapter Six: Northwestern Pines**

"You ready, babe?" Kristen asked, sitting beside her husband in the living room. Neither of them knew how Preston Northwest had gotten their number, but he did, and he insisted on stopping by for a 'visit'.

"There is no 'ready'." Joe groaned, not looking foreword to this meeting. During his summers here, Joe had been subjected to bullying by Preston, despite the rich boy being nearly a decade older than him. Unlike their children, they had parted on less-than-good terms and had never become friends.

"Well, the kids said the Northwests lost most of their fortune, and that had to be a hard blow." Kristen said. "Maybe they're not as bad as we remember."

"Yeah, and at least Pacifica's not that bad." Joe shrugged, remembering his first encounter with the girl at Mabel's slumber party last night. Although the kids had made mention of her before, emphasizing how kind she was compared to her father, he had been surprised at just how polite and modest she was. In fact, was she even raised by Preston?

"That's the spirit." Kristen smiled and kissed Joe on the cheek. He smiled at her. His mood plummeted hard, however, at the sound of the doorbell. Joe took a deep breath, and went to answer the door. Kristen didn't hear anyone exchanging greetings but Joe quickly returned, followed by the Northwests, who sat on the couch opposite their loveseat.

"Joseph Pines." Preston acknowledged, sounding as uppity as ever.

"Preston Northwest." Joe returned coldly.

"Oh my God." Kristen muttered and pinched the bridge of her nose with her fingers. Somehow she'd thought that they would have been less petty now that they were both adults. Clearly, she gave them too much credit.

"So I hear you lost your family's money." Joe said, a hint of a taunt in his voice.

"Hardly. It was your uncle's doing." Preston told him. Joe raised an eyebrow. "If it weren't for him, Bill's reign would have continued, those bonds would have gone through and we'd have even more money now."

"Genius." Joe gave him a dry look at this. "Pure genius."

"Alright, you two." Kristen said, standing up. "This is too pathetic for me, so I'll be in the kitchen." And with that, she walked in the direction of the kitchen. Priscilla, who had watched all of this in silence, thought this was a good idea and got up to follow the other woman. Now alone, the men glared at each other for a moment before starting again.

"You'll do well to keep your kids away from my daughter, Pines." Preston said, and Joe's look hardened at his tone. "They've been an abysmal influence on her. That boy alone has turned her into a smart-mouthed little rebel."

"Possibly." Joe returned. "But Dipper tells me that you actually conditioned her with a bell like a dog; you sure it's not that type of thing that caused it?"

"I had a perfectly obedient daughter before." Preston seethed, ignoring Joe's question. "Than along come your brats and suddenly she's associating with commoners and disobeying me. Sneaking out, talking back, running around with lumberjacks."

"Sounds like a teenage girl." Joe said, thankful that his own daughter wasn't so troublesome. Preston's eye twitched.

In the kitchen, things were a fair bit less hostile. Kristen didn't take offense to the way Priscilla eyed her cup of tea; she knew she was probably used to more sophisticated beverages than a cup of hot water with a cheap teabag.

As opposed to their husbands, Kirsten and Priscilla had met only once, when Joe and Preston had gone about comparing their girlfriends. Suffice to say Kristen hadn't been fond of this, but Priscilla had been proud to have been shown off like the trophy she was, even if it was to a pair of kids.

"Ya think they're comparing kids?" Kristen asked, sitting down at the table opposite Priscilla.

"If they aren't already, they probably will." she sighed. "Of course, that question boils down to quality or quantity."

Kristen decided to ignore that crack for the sake of things, and spoke. "Well, we weren't really planning on having twins, but Dipper's still the best surprise we've ever gotten."

"I can't imagine having two." Priscilla said. "I never realized how much work this 'child raising' thing was without a team of butlers."

"You mean with your teenager?" Kristen asked and Priscilla nodded, seeming to have missed her tone. "Speaking of, the kids said you trained her with a bell?"

"Oh, please don't." Priscilla groaned softly, sounding more tiered than anything else. "We don't have the money to buy our way out of trouble anymore and we're already on Child Protective Services' watch-list." Priscilla stared into her still-full cup, looking genuinely remorseful. "We...well, I've been trying to be better with her. Preston..."

The women heard the door open, and Dipper's voice call that they were home. Back at the entrance to the living room, Preston stood facing and glaring at Dipper, Mabel and Pacifica, who had clearly just gotten out of school.

"Afternoon, Mr. N." Dipper said, smirking at his furious face and looking rather cocky.

"We're ba-aack!" Mabel sang and despite herself, Pacifica couldn't hide her small laugh. She stopped and looked down when her father's glare snapped to her.

"Pacifica, I thought we agreed that you'd be coming straight home after school." Preston said, narrowing his eyes. "You know the rules."

"I was, but the car's out front." Pacifica returned, seeming to regain some of her confidence.

"Well, we were just leaving." Preston said, though it was clear that this decision was really last minute. Priscilla and Kristen approached from the kitchen. "Pacifica, you're grounded."

Pacifica looked incredulous at this. "For what?"

"You were to come directly home, not fritter away even more time with them." Preston said. It was pretty clear that he was making this up as he want along.

"I wasn't 'frittering away' with them, and they're my friends." she said. Her voice was steady and she was looking him in the eye, but her shoulders were lightly shaking.

"Trouble is what they are." Preston said.

"And proud of it!" Mabel shot at him.

"Mabel." Kristen said in a warning tone. Dipper reached for Pacifica, meaning to give her some sort of reassurance; she was clearly scared.

"Don't touch her!" Preston said, raising his voice and making Pacifica flinch. Dipper's glare hardened as he firmly clasped his hand on her shoulder, as if to ask: 'what are you gonna do about it?'.

Preston grabbed Dipper by his shirt, causing several things happen at once. Joe and Kristen tensed up in alarm, Pacifica grabbed Dipper's lower arm (making Preston's stomach churn), Mabel's fists clinched as though she was ready to physically defend her brother, and Priscilla half-begged; "Preston, don't, he's just a boy." Dipper just kept that same daring look on his face.

Preston forced himself to calm down, if only in the interest of not being outnumbered. He let go of Dipper's shirt slowly. "Consider yourself fortunate that that troublesome uncle of yours cost me as much as he did. If he hadn't, I would still have certain connections."

"Get out, Northwest." Joe was chillingly calm, his patience having run out. Threatening his son was crossing a line.

"Very well." Preston seethed. His gaze snapped to his daughter, and she flinched again at the look, and than over to his wife, who only looked downcast. "We're going home."

As Preston saw himself out, Priscilla sighed and walked up to her daughter. She placed a hand on her shoulder, which Pacifica didn't flinch at. "Let's go, sweetie. No point in getting your father more upset."

Pacifica didn't say anything; she often went completely quiet when her father was in these moods. She merely hugged Mabel goodbye, and than Dipper before her mother lead her out the door. She gave them one last sad look before the door closed. The tenseness in the air lasted until the sound of an expensive car pulled out from in front of the house and the sound faded. Joe fell onto the loveseat as though he was exhausted. Mabel was the first to speak.

"Dad, Pacifica's our friend." she started, clearly thinking their friendship had been jeopardized and not liking the idea at all.

"I never said you had to give up your friendship with Pacifica." Joe said. "Personally, I wouldn't trust them, but...if it'll make you two happy, than go ahead. From what I've heard, you've been a good influence on her."

"Yeah." Dipper blushed, the memory of Pacifica hugging him back at her mansion two years ago popping up unbidden into his mind.

Hours later, Mabel was in her room, sitting up in her bed. She had been exchanging texts with Pacifica, asking if she okay or if she was grounded. The grayness of everything gave her a sinking feeling and, somehow, she knew she was dreaming. Everything was still and silent.

"H-Hello?" Mabel called, only to be greeted by her own echo for a moment. Before she could call again, a laugh filled the air. No, it wasn't a laugh. It was a high, chilling cackle that was far too familiar. Mabel's heart sped up in terror. No, it couldn't be...

"Miss me, Shooting Star?" Mabel's mouth went dry as a dark spot appeared in the air and took the form of a triangle. The shape took on a yellow color so bright that it seemed to glow, and a single, hunting eye with a cat-like pupil opened up and looked straight at her. Mabel could only watch, paralyzed.

"B-Bill..." she stuttered breathlessly.

"How ya been, kid?" Bill asked in the deceptively friendly manner he had been so good at. "I would of dropped by to see Pine Tree first, but his subconscious seems...a little busy tonight."

"H-how?...When did...? Where did you...?" Mabel stuttered, part of her mind simply rebelling against this whole thing.

"Don't bother with the denial, kid, I'm really back." Bill said. "I'll get resurrected in twenty-five years, and your brother'll invent this contentment device that drags me back to this time. You know, you're right about him; he really is a killjoy. A killjoy, a dork, a creep -"

"Don't insult Dipper like that!" Mabel yelled at him.

"Why not?" Bill asked. "You do it all the time."

"It's just teasing." Mabel defended. "That's all in fun."

"That's not what I've seen." Bill said and gave a series of hard blinks. With each blink came a vision of the first summer the twins had spent in Gravity Falls. Dipper forfeiting the ball-toss game so she could get Waddles, her picking on him for his barely shorter size, him going out of his way to save her merman friend, costing him his first job, and the flashes went on. Just as she was about to ask what all of that was, Bill's eye turned back to normal and he explained. "You've been pretty selfish, haven't you? Pine Tree's sacrificed so much for you, and you repay him by picking on him. No wonder he was ready to ditch you before you broke that rift."

"I was just a dumb kid, than. Things are different now." Mabel muttered, trying to avoid the realization that she was trying to convince herself more than Bill. "Dipper was okay. Dipper was always okay. He...He was the kind of person who didn't need help on anything. He was...He _is_ a hero, and heroes can get out of anything."

"Ah the ramblings of a terrible sister." Bill mused.

Mabel's eyes began to fill with tears at the demon's words and before she knew what was happening, she charged at Bill and threw a punch at him. He simply flouted out of the way and tutted at her. "Always the headstrong one, eh, Shooting Star? Well, now that I'm here, I'll be keeping my eye on all of you. See ya in your nightmares, kid!" Bill tipped his hat and vanished in a flash of light, surrounded by that same old circle.

Mabel gasped as she awoke. She felt sweat in her hair and her was heart pounding. She gripped her sheets with her fists and her eyes were wide. Her phone lay on the floor forgotten. She was frozen in horror as a wave a fresh tears ran down her face.

* * *

Dun, dun, dun, DU~U~U~UN! Review.


	8. Reinforcements

**Chapter Seven: Reinforcements**

"Miss Pines!" Mabel jolted awake, disorientated for a while before realizing she was in her math class, the eyes of her classmates on her and Mrs. Alten giving her a disproving look. "What did we just say?"

Mabel, still groggy, tried to force her mind to work. "Uh...Long division...Formulas, uh...Live long and prosper?" she tried with a guilty-looking grin.

"See me after class." Mrs. Alten said and walked back to the front of the room to continue the day's lesson. Mabel's face fell in disappointment and a few of the kids snickered.

It had been a couple of days since her encounter with Bill. She'd only just worked up the courage to tell Dipper yesterday and he was every bit as mad as she thought he'd be at her, though for not coming to him with this imminently. Mabel could have sworn he'd be mad at her for being a bad sister, like Bill had said she was. When she brought this up, Dipper had practically yelled her to ignore anything that demon told her. Part of her knew it was dumb, but another part couldn't forget the taunting. And of course they had to tell their parents. That was fun.

These thoughts haunted her for the rest of class, the bell snapping her out of it. The pit in her stomach from the thoughts grew worse as her classmates made their ways to lunch, while she approached Mrs. Alten's desk. She wasn't really scared of that, though; she was too tired to feel very much right now. So far, Bill had only visited her that one time, but she had been too scared to sleep since than.

"Mabel." Mrs. Alten called, grabbing her attention with a confused 'huh?'. "This is the second class you've fallen asleep in."

"I...haven't been getting a lot of sleep the last few nights." Mabel said.

"Well see to it that you start or I'll have to call your parents." This woke Mabel up. She'd always felt it was some unspoken rule that anything supernatural was never to bleed into their school-life. What if they forbade her from going monster hunting again? What if they extended that punishment to Dipper? She'd already cost him so much, she couldn't do that to him!

"No," Mabel said, now making a visible effort to appear awake. "I...I won't fall asleep again."

"If you do, I'll be calling your parents. Do we have an understanding?" the teacher asked. Not daring to speak, Mabel only nodded and was dismissed to lunch with her mind still in a bit of a fog. She wasn't surprised to see Dipper waiting for her outside the room. Ever since she'd told him about Bill, he'd become very protective of her...Well, more-so than he already was.

"Sorry, Dip." Mabel told him as they began walking to lunch together. "I fell asleep and Mrs. Alten kept me for a talk."

"S'fine." Dipper said absently. So long as she was safe.

Mabel didn't feel like eating, so she just went right to their table. Sitting across from her, Pacifica, Wendy and Robbie gave her sympathetic looks. All any of them had gotten was texts this morning giving them the gist of things, but they knew about Bill.

"You okay, Mabel?" Wendy asked, looking concerned.

"Tired." Mabel said with a yawn. "But I'm fine."

"So are we going to have to go through that end-of-the-world thing again?" Pacifica asked.

"Not if I can help it." Dipper said, coming up to them with his lunch in hand.

"What about those old guys Wendy used to work for?" Robbie asked. "Did ya tell them?"

"Yeah, if anyone needs to know, it's Stan and Ford." Wendy said.

"Soos got through to them last night." Dipper explained. "They're half way around the world right now, and they were coming back to town for the holidays anyway."

"So it'll be a couple weeks before we can even do anything?" Pacifica asked. Dipper nodded.

"What're we supposed to do until then?" Wendy asked, looking impatient.

"I don't know, but we need to keep it down for now" Dipper said. "We don't want to start a panic."

"Can I tell my dad?" Pacifica asked, smirking. "I'm still grounded and I wanna get back at him." This seemed to lighten the mood a bit as the five snickered, each feeling as though there had been some tension that was broken.

"Thanks, Pacifica." Mabel smiled at the other girl. "I really needed that."

"You know what else you need?" Wendy asked, grabbing the sandwich from her lunch and pushing it into Mabel's hands. "Eat something, Pines."

Mabel still didn't feel very hungry, but she took a large bite of the sandwich anyway if only to keep her friends from worrying about her. Watching her keenly, Dipper didn't pay much mind when a guy approached them, standing behind Pacifica.

"Hey, Paz." Pacifica stiffened at the unwelcome voice behind her and even more unwelcome hands clutching her shoulders. Dipper's eyes narrowed slightly, this action now demanding his attention. "Whadda ya say you come to homecoming with me?"

"We broke up, Marty." Pacifica told him, her eyes on her food. Wendy was glaring at Marty; the younger girl had poured her heart out to her after their break up last year, and she had not forgotten it. Robbie, who was as clueless as the Pines twins, just gave an amused look to a plainly unhappy Dipper.

"Come on, sweetie." the boy purred. "Can't we put all that behind us?"

"You cheated on me, so no! I don't think we can 'put all that behind us'!" Pacifica spoke loudly, pulling herself out of Marty's grasp. Several heads from nearby tables turned in their direction.

"Who's he?" Mabel asked, and she was the only one who didn't look explicitly upset. Dipper's stomach churned as the boy's gaze snapped to his sister.

"Marty Rackin." Wendy muttered. From her tone, one would think she was the one who'd been cheated on.

"Who?" Dipper asked, though for once he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer.

"I met him after you guys left, and we're not together anymore." Pacifica said firmly.

"And who are these?" Marty asked, eying Mabel and Dipper in turn. "The famous Pines twins, I take it?"

"You got it." Dipper answered, his tone barely concealing hostility so that the girls all looked at him in surprise; not even Mable had ever heard him talk in such a tone before.

"Back when we were dating," Marty paused and locked eyes with Dipper, almost tauntingly. "Almost all she would talk about was you two. Especially Dipper."

Dipper didn't move, but his blood boiled. Part of him wanted to punch this guy for some reason, but the rest of him remembered that they were still at school. He wasn't about to get in trouble for fighting. Pacifica looked away from Dipper, not wanting him to see her face, which was surely red.

"So," Marty carried on silkily. "About homecoming..."

"No." Pacifica said again and Wendy continued to glare at the boy.

"Aw you don't mean that." Marty smirked and reached for her. Dipper tensed up for a moment.

Out of nowhere, Robbie stood up and soundly punched Marty from across the table, who fell to the floor with a bloody nose. Students eating nearby gasped and backed away in surprise, a few of them running off to find teachers. Marty seemed to seamlessly slip into the role of scared, bullied little boy to the teacher who helped him up, telling him that they were going to the nurse now, and to calm down. Robbie glared disgustedly at him as another teacher took him by the arm, apparently to the principals office.

"Guys," Robbie called to them as he was pulled away. "Get back to me when you can about this, okay?"

"Sure." Dipper called back, his mind in a confused fog for a moment at how quickly things had happened.

"You okay, Fluffy?" Wendy asked. Pacifica, still aggravated, hummed her response. Mabel, in spite of herself, snickered at the nickname. "So about the whole Bill thing." Wendy started, turning to Dipper. "What's our first move?"

"McGucket." Dipper said, beginning to calm down. "He's the next best person for this after Stan or Ford. We'll drop by the mansion after school. Wait; it is still standing, right?"

Which they did. Wendy and Mabel, that is. Being grounded, Pacifica was to report home imminently after school, and she wasn't eager lengthen her sentence. Dipper had decided to stay behind after school, partly for Robbie and partly for himself. He'd completed his homework after about fifteen minutes, and used the rest of the time to think to himself. What if Bill really was back? Why had he gone after Mabel this time? Speaking of which, what was up with her lately? She couldn't possibly still be hung up over those lies Bill tried to feed her. Could she? Had the girls gone to get Gideon and Soos on their way to McGucket's? Why had Robbie punched that kid at lunch? When did Pacifica have a boyfriend?

"Dipstick?" Dipper was startled out of his thoughts and looked at a confused-looking Robbie. "What're you still doin' here?"

"I told the girls I needed time to think, so I just hung behind here for a while." Dipper said. "They're probably already at McGucket's."

"C'mon." Robbie said. "I'll give ya a ride up to the mansion."

The ride started out quiet. It was a few moments before Dipper decided to speak. "So, how long do you have detention for?"

"I get to stay one hour after school every day for the rest of the week." Robbie said, rolling his eyes in annoyance.

"Why'd you do it?" Dipper asked. "It's not like he was bothering you."

"Hm." Robbie shrugged. "I saw how jealous you were. Figured I'd do it for ya."

"Jealous?" Dipper's cheeks heated up despite his outrage. "Of what?"

"Kid, I know what it looks like, especially on you." Robbie gave a small grin. "You were five seconds away from punching that kid away from Northwest. Nice to know you're over Wendy, though."

"Well..." Dipper fought down his blush and searched for a new topic. "Are we cool now? I mean, neither of us got Wendy and we're both over her, so..."

"Ah, I've got Tambry." Robbie said, grinning fondly thinking of his girlfriend as the car began climbing the hill towards the mansion. "Don't get me wrong, you're still a nuisance, but as long as you don't go snooping around her, we're cool, Squirt."

"No worries." Dipper assured. "I'm not interested."

"Oh, I know." Robbie smirked, giving the kid a playfully taunting look. "All you can see is the Northwest girl."

Dipper rolled his eyes tiredly, part of him wondering if Mabel was somehow behind this teasing. "I walked right into this conversation, didn't I?" he asked. Robbie shrugged again.

The gates to the mansion were wide open. The moment the boys walked through the front door, McGucket grabbed Dipper by his arms. "Dipper! He's back! He's been back!"

"I know, McGucket." Dipper told him, pulling himself away. McGucket still looked pretty much the same, although maybe his hair was a bit whiter. "Mabel told us Bi -"

"No!" McGucket howled, and for a moment seemed every bit as insane as he had seemed in their first meeting years ago. It was...unsettling. "Bill's been back since those kids came from the future!"

Dipper blinked as McGucket let him go. "What?" he asked as he and Robbie followed McGucket into a sitting room, where the others were – or they would have if Dipper hadn't been tackled to the ground. Dipper sat up and shook his head straight, ready to tell off whoever it was who ran into him, but he stopped.

It was a girl he'd never seen before, who's face took on a look of horror when she looked at him. Dipper found her bright blue eyes startling; they reminded him of Pacifica's eyes. "Chris, are you -" a familiar voice called, and it took Dipper a moment to recognize that Stan kid and his friend from before. What were they doing here? "Uh-oh."

* * *

Woo-hoo! I've passed the one-hundred mark! Just for that, I have a gift for you guys because you're all just awesome! I'm giving you a bonus chapter that gives a bit of insight into the lives of Stan II and friends, as well as the return of Bill in-story. Review!


	9. Bonus Chapter

**Bonus Chapter: The Future**

The year was 2039, but Gravity Falls hadn't changed too much apart from the usual fare of it's human population and a few aspects of the town.

"Keep away!" A voice rang out from the school-yard of the middle school, even though classes had just let out. While most of their schoolmates naturally chose to head home, five of the larger boys stood in a circle, tossing around a familiar white and blue hat with a pine tree design. In the center of the circle, futilely following the hat and failing to grab it was a smaller boy by the name of Stan Pines.

"Come on, stop!" the boy begged. "That was my dad's!"

One of the boys scoffed as he held the hat out of Stan's reach. "Jeez, runt." he taunted. "How can you be the son of _the_ Dipper Pines? Named after heroes, even, and you're still a wimp."

"Give it back!" Stan yelled, grabbing for the hat and receiving a punch in the face. His nose started bleeding and he was pulled from the concrete by another one of the boys.

A short, sharp whistle caught everyone's attention. The bigger boys all looked horrified, and Stan smiled warmly. There stood Chris, staring the bullies down. Unlike Stan, Crystal Pines was fierce and brave and, as those boys knew very well, she never took kindly to anyone who so much as taunted her little brother.

Standing beside her and looking far less intimidating stood their cousin Chloe. Having seen the boys cornering Stan earlier, Chloe had rushed over to the neighboring high-school to report to Chris. She wouldn't be able to do much against all of them, but Chris could scare them away.

"Drop him." she hissed at them, her voice low and menacing. Stan was released, quickly grabbed the forgotten hat, and bolted to the girls, throwing her arms around Chris in tears. Chris gave Stan a one-armed hug as she continued to glare at the bullies. She jerked herself forward threateningly, and the boys scattered. Stan wiped his still bloody nose on his arm as he silently followed the girls to the boutique a few blocks away; a frequent after-school stop for the kids, especially after these kinds of incidents.

The Unique Boutique was a fairly small store, founded, funded and headed by the kids' mothers. Vibrantly colored sweaters with unique images, elegant and softly-colored gowns, and everything in between. There was also all manor of accessories such as buttons, pins, hats, and jewelery. The racks were always a circle of rainbow colors and most of the customers were kids and teenagers looking for something unique and everything was completely custom-made.

The cashier, a long-time friend of their mothers', waved them over. "Hello, you three. Are you looking for your mothers?"

"Hi, Ms. Chiu." Stan greeted politely

"Hey, Jess, Chucky!." Chris called, leaving the kids to meet a pair of her friends she spotted in the back of the store.

"Stan, what happened?" Candy asked, sounding a bit alarmed. Before Stan could ask her not to, Candy disappeared into the back room and reappeared with two more women in tow. As soon as she saw him, Stan's mother hurried over to him and began looking him over. "Oh, Stan. Not again, come on, honey." she said as she took his hand and lead him to the back room, where a first-aid kit was kept. With how often this happened, it was practically routine.

No sooner did Stan and his mother disappear into the back room than Dipper arrived, closely followed by a redheaded boy in a flannel shirt.

"Hey, Dip." Mabel greeted.

"Hi Uncle Dipper." Chloe said. "Hi, Jack."

"Sup, Chloe." The boy greeted and ruffled her hair affectionately.

"Hi girls." he returned rather absently as he glanced around. He was clearly disappointed that his wife was nowhere to be seen.

"Nice to see you, too, bro." Mabel smirked fondly. "She's in the back with Stan."

"He got beat up again." Chloe said. Dipper sighed and walked into the back room as Jack made his way to Chris and her friends. He smirked and waited behind Chris.

"Hey, Jack." a dark-skinned, black haired girl greeted.

"Nice try, Jess." Chris scoffed playfully. "I'm not falling for that one again."

"Falling for what?" Chris's heart jumped and she swerved around. Blue eyes found green, and Jack smirked; he enjoyed the effect he had on her.

"N-nothing...Jack." Chris stuttered. Far from the feisty girl who had defended her brother from bullies not an hour earlier, Chris was now quiet and shy. Jack knew that Chris had a crush on him, and he knew he found her kind of cute, but he wasn't about to make the first move. Until than, he'd get his kicks turning her legs into jelly.

Back at the front of the store, Stan emerged from the back room, having been fixed up. He looked decidedly uncomfortable as he closed the door behind him, thinking that parents should never be allowed to make out. He figured his father must have had a rough day at the old observatory; whenever one of his parents had a rough day, they would often get frisky with one another. Gross.

It was the next day, just after breakfast. Stan's heart was pounding with the excitement; this was his first ever solo exploration. His parents were both at work, Chris had been adamant about having a relaxing Saturday at home, and Chloe was hanging out with some other friends. It had taken all morning to convince his parents that he could handle going out there all by himself.

There was a cave that he and Chloe had found last weekend. A deep one. So his mother insisted that he taking a ball of yarn as to not get lost. Stan took the flashlight out of his backpack and lite up the red clay walls of the cave. Eventually, he found something; cave painting. His father would be pleased with this discovery; humans lived here long before the town was actually founded. Stan felt proud of his discovery, and searched for more and more paintings. Eventually he stumbled upon a huge one.

It was a giant yellow triangle, with one eye, a top-hat and a bow-tie. It was enclosed in a circle that was made up of smaller pictures; a pair of glasses, a tree, two stars, a heart, some kind of animal, and a few other things.

Stan grew very excited. This was a terrific find! His father would love this; there was nothing like this in any of his journals. He would finally make him proud. The kids at school always said he was an embarrassment to the Pines name, and now they'd eat their words, too.

Below the painting was something curious; something that was clearly written in marker. Stan red the familiar letters, but there was no word he recognized; must have been some other language. He wondered who put this here as he tried to read the words out loud. "Tr-triangulum, en-tan-gulum. Ve-ne foris do-minus ment-ium. Vene foris vi-den-tis om-nium. Ega-ssem s-draw-kcab, egassem sdraw-kcab, egassem sdrawkcab, egassem sdrawkcab, egassem sdrawkcab."

Stan was vaguely aware that everything had become black and white and there was this stillness. He jumped as the silence was broken abruptly by a high laugh. Something, like a fog or mist, leaked from nearby shadows to create a triangle, which opened a large cat-like eye and took on a yellow color that was bright against the gray background. It was the image.

"Oh, man!" the thing said, stretching it's little black limbs as though it had been sitting still for a long time. "Good thing that incantation got through. I'da been a goner."

"H-hello?" Stan asked in a small voice. The eye flitted to him, apparently having just noticed him. Stan cringed in fear as the triangle grew to a monstrous size and zoomed up very close to him. Stan cracked open and eye to peer at the creature as he shrank down to his original size and flouted a ways away from him. "Hehehe. Well wadda ya know? Looks like ol' Pine Tree managed to drop a cone. Name's Bill, kid. Bill Cipher."

"I-I'm...Stan." Stan said. "Stan Pines." For an instant, Bill flitted a frightening red, but the bright yellow was back unnaturally quick. "What...are you?"

"Just your friendly neighborhood dream demon." Bill said pleasantly. "Some people don't appreciate a good party, and a pair of jerks nearly killed me. Hey, thanks a bunch for bringing me back, little buddy."

Stan grinned. "Well, at least I did something right."

"Lemme guess." Bill rolled his eye. "Everyone expects ya to be like those heroes in your family, but you're just spineless little you." Stan nodded glumly. "Hey, I get ya, kid. Want a few pointers?"

Stan's eyes widened. "You...you'd help me?"

"Heck ya, you helped me." Bill said. "There's just one catch, though. Don't tell anyone I'm back, especially your folks. I want it to be...a surprise."

"Deal." Stan grinned, having lost all hints of fear. Bill was so easy to talk to.

"Deal." Bill nodded, and took the boy's hand. Their joined hands were enveloped in familiar blue flame. It was easy to see the resemblance between this boy and the Pines brothers. The boy was so gullible, and very simple-minded.

* * *

Ya like that? Before anyone asks, I have no idea who Chloe's father is. Maybe Mabel's a single mother, all I do know is that it's not Gideon. Also, Jack isn't a play on 'lumberjack', I just sort of like the name Jack. Review.


	10. Questions And Answers

**Chapter Eight: Questions And Answers**

"My future kids?" Dipper asked, quite uncertain about his feelings about all of this. He and the others, Gideon and Soos included, were gathered around and had only just finished listening to the story.

"And mine!" Mabel beamed and Dipper smiled warmly at her; she seemed like her old self again as she squeezed Chloe, who squeezed back with an uncannily similar smile. Those two were definitely related.

"With who?" Dipper questioned. He knew there should have been more pressing questions from all of this, and why this was the first question to come from his mouth, he had no idea.

"Oh, we're not supposed to say." Chris said. "If you knew than you might not...well, ya know – and we wouldn't exist."

"I guess that makes sense." Dipper shrugged.

"W-we came back here to stop Bill however we can." Stan stuttered, but he did look determined.

"Sorry." Dipper said, looking dejected. "But nothing can really be done until our uncles get back from their trip in a couple of weeks."

"So, we get to hang out here for a while longer." Chloe said with a smile, her eyes shimmering.

"Brace yourselves." Chris told everyone as she and Stan were quick to place their hands over their ears. Those who managed to do the same in time were spared the ear-shattering squeal Chloe let out. The girl must have had some of her uncle in her as well.

"This is so cool!" Chloe gushed. "We get to see this place in it's heyday. I wonder what was there before the boutique. Let's go see –" Chloe's words became a series of muffles when Chris covered her mouth.

"Hold on, we can't get too comfortable here." Chris told her. "We're not even from this time and we still have a job to do."

Mabel looked at Dipper. "Yep, she's yours." Dipper rolled his eyes at this.

"So, Chloe." Gideon asked, puffing his chest out proudly. "How am I in the future? I wonderful father, I suppose?" Mabel blanched in horror at the thought.

"Who are you again?" Chloe asked, looking genuinely confused, and the look on Gideon's face earned snickers from Wendy, Dipper and Robbie.

"You weren't listening before, were you?" Chris asked Gideon, her arms crossed. She sighed, deciding that it was too stuffy in here with all of these people, a few of which she could only just recognize. Actually, it was pretty cool seeing the younger versions of people she saw every day like Jack's mom, Jess's dad, and Mr. Mystery. Idly, she wondered if Danny was around yet. How long ago was this again? "On second thought, maybe some sight-seeing wouldn't so bad."

"Hey, can we go see grandma and grandpa?" Chloe asked, reminding Dipper of the deal he had with his parents in the first place.

"Might as well," Dipper said. "We're supposed to tell them about big things like this anyway."

"So are we done here?" Robbie asked.

"Like Dipper said, there ain't much we can do without Stan n' Ford." McGucket told him. "So long as we know what's goin' on."

"Well, let's go, than." Chris shrugged and the group began to head out.

The Pines', Chloe and Gideon had piled into Soos's pickup-truck. Gideon was sulking in a backseat, looking remarkably like that violent boy who'd tried again and again to outright kill the Pines twins before. This wasn't lost on Dipper, who sat as far as he could from the kid and eyed him wearily, even with Chris and Stan between them.

Mabel sat upfront with Soos, on his own request. "So, hambone, where was Pacifica?"

"Oh, her dad grounded her, so she couldn't be there." Mabel said. Soos looked disappointed. "Why?"

"I need her help." Soos said. "It's a huge secret, but I need her to help me with an errand."

"Well, her house is only a couple of blocks away from ours, so we could walk the rest of the way." Mabel said. "Maybe you can convince her dad to let her go on the errand. All you half to do is not mention us."

"Huh." Soos said. "Good idea."

"Okay, here's the block." Mabel said. Soos parked in the middle of a neighboring street and the kids unloaded fro the car. Gideon practically stomped the other way toward his house, as the rest of the kids started down the street.

Soos waited out a good five minutes, his heart thumping. He was really doing this, wasn't he? The Northwest house itself was still fairly big, but small enough so that it just blended in with the surrounding houses. He took a deep, calming breath as he rang the doorbell. A butler answered the door.

"Hey, dude." Soos greeted. "Can I talk to Pacifica for a minute."

"One moment, sir." the butler said, and left a nervous Soos standing alone for a moment. When he returned, he was accompanied not by Pacifica, but her father who looked very unamused.

"Who are you?" the man asked.

"Soos Ramirez, Mr. Mystery." Soos said. "I know this probably looks bad, but your daughter is the only one who can help me with a super-secret errand. It's really important."

"Soos?" Pacifica questioned, coming up beside her father.

"So you do know this man?" Preston asked, still eying him with suspicion.

"He's a friend of a friend, but I know him." Pacifica said. "He's safe, I swear."

"He says he needs your help on an errand." Preston said.

"Well, can I? I swear I'll come right back when it's over." Pacifica asked. Soos held his breath. Honestly, he knew what this must have looked like. Maybe he should have thought this trough more.

"Fine." Preston narrowed his eyes, still plainly distrusting of Soos. "But you'll be accompanied by a butler and Pacifica, you are to keep your phone on, are we clear?"

"Crystal." she rolled her eyes as she and the butler headed to the truck on their own. Soos raised a hand in a farewell, but the door was slammed in his face.

Soos got into the truck and started to where they needed to go, his heart speeding up again. There really was no turning back.

"So what do you need me for?" Pacifica asked. She was in the passenger's seat, and the butler was in the backseat. Soos could fell him watching them.

"Well, I need you to help me pick something out." Soos said. "I'm not very good at these things, and I need your advice."

"Well, what do you need picked out?" Pacifica asked.

"It's a secret." Soos said. "Like, really, _really_ secret. You can't tell anyone. At least, until after Christmas."

"Right." she said. "But you know my dad's gonna hate hearing that when I get back."

"Just keep the secret." Soos said. "Please."

Pacifica sighed. "Alright, it's a secret."

At the Pines house, things were going on surprisingly smoothly.

"We should have anticipated this, shouldn't we?" Kristen asked. Joe nodded.

"So, you're our future grandkids." he said, looking at the three kids huddled on the couch.

"What year are you from?" Kristen asked.

"2039." Chloe said.

"And how old are you?" Kristen asked Chris.

"Sixteen." Chris asked, wondering what was going on. Kristen blinked, quickly doing the math in her head. Thirty-nine minus fifteen...

"Dipper, you're grounded. For three days." she said.

Dipper blinked. "For what?"

"Giving me less than ten years before I become a grandmother." Kristen said.

"So..." Joe started, clearly trying to steer away from this. "Where are you three staying?"

"The old mansion with McGucket." Chris said. "We lost Blendin a while ago, so it looks like we're stuck here for a couple more weeks. Actually, Da – uh Dipper, when you get ungrounded, Stan's always wanted to go on adventures with you. Whadda ya say?"

* * *

Reason I know that it's okay to have time-traveling future offspring revealing themselves to their past!parents: in the original script for _Blendin's Game_ , Soos's son was to arrive from the future to tell Soos that he will be a wonderful father. N-aaw! Oh, and speaking of Soos, what does he specifically need Pacifica for? Hmm...Review.


	11. Shadowcats

**Chapter Nine: Shadowcats**

"So, what are we looking for again?" Stan asked, making sure to keep close to Dipper as they moved through the old mines. Dipper had had to take the lantern from him, he was shaking so much.

"Whatever bit Mabel yesterday." Dipper said, looking far more confidant then the younger boy.

They had been exploring these mines with the girls the day before, when Mabel wandered a small way into the darkness and screamed. When they'd found her, she was sitting on the ground with a bloody bite-mark on the back of her leg. In accordance to the deal the twins had with their parents, the exploration was over for that day and Mabel was now laid up for however long it took the wound to heal. Dipper alternated between anger and nausea as they found the splat of dried blood. His grip tightened on the lantern. Whatever had done this, he would make it would pay.

"What if it bites us?" Stan asked, wishing he was as brave as Dipper.

"We've got a first-aid kit." Dipper answered. In light of his sister's injury, his mother had forced them to pack it or else they weren't coming back to the mines. "Come on, I won't let anything -"

A caterwaul echoed through the mines, making Stan jump and cling to Dipper from behind. "What's that?"

"Didn't sound like one of the dinosaurs." Dipper said, mostly to himself, but Stan still heard it.

"Dinosaurs?" he asked, sounding somewhere between worried and confused.

"Sounded more like a cat." Dipper said, seeming not to have heard him, and Stan had to remind himself; this was his father at fifteen who'd only just met him. This wasn't the same man who would take down a whole herd of angry unicorns to protect him and his sister. This was just an adventurous boy out to teach a lesson to whatever hurt his sister. "A big cat."

At that same moment, Stan felt a pair of eyes watching him. Looking around, he saw what appeared to be a den a few feet away, with a pair of cold yellow eyes watching him. Noticing this, Dipper turned the lantern towards the den. The den lit up and the creature hissed as though it were in pain, and bolted away into the blackness so quickly that neither boy even got a good look at it.

"What was that?" Stan asked.

"That cat. Medium size, though, not big." Dipper said, and he approached the den slowly. The creature was clearly still around, spitting and hissing at them the whole time, but it didn't approach them as Dipper investigated the den in confusion. There were claw-marks throughout the den and bones of prey animals, but otherwise the place was clean. Not a strand of fur to be seen. One would think this thing would at least shed.

"Weird." Dipper said.

Just behind him, Stan was watching the cat, who continued to growl and snarl at them, but it didn't attack at first. With what sounded like a cry of agony, the cat swiped a black claw at Stan, who backed away in alarm. Right into Dipper, who dropped the lantern. The moment the light blinked out, the cat screeched and the boys started running. The cat gave pursuit, and by the sounds of it, it gathered some friends.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it!" Stan yelled over at Dipper. Dipper was quiet as he brainstormed. He understood why the cat was attacking them, they'd violated it's den, obviously. But why now? Only after the lantern...The lantern. It connected in his brain like magnets.

"Stan, my backpack, the flashlight!" Dipper yelled. Stan only gave him a scared look, and Dipper huffed in frustration, taking his backpack off and blindly gripping through it. He ended up tripping over a rock, falling to the ground and spilling his things everywhere. As the cats drew closer, Dipper began losing his mind to panic and frantically began feeling around for one of the two flashlights. Luckily, he found one quickly, switched it on and turned it on the cats. They wailed, giving the boys a brief look at their ink-black pelts, and raced away from the light.

The sound of the boys' labored breathing filled the cave along with the angry spits and snarls from the cats. Silently, Stan began picking up Dipper's things and packing them back up, Dipper keeping the cats at bay with the flashlight.

"It's light." Dipper said once he breath returned. "They hate light."

"We know what bit Aunt Mabel." Stan said, holding the second flashlight and handing Dipper his refilled backpack. "Can we go home, now?"

"Sure. I need to take write all this down anyway." Dipper said. He'd left his journal back home for this very reason. With Dipper lightly waving the flashlight behind them to keep the cats away and Stan pointing his forward to show them the path out of the mines, the trip was surprisingly peaceful.

"Sorry." Stan said, looking upset. "If I didn't make you break the lantern, they wouldn't have attacked us."

"Actually," Dipper said, giving the kid a reassuring smile. "if you didn't make me break the lantern, we'd probably still be wondering what was up with that den. Sometimes, you need a little risk to help get you going." Stan contemplated this for a while, and both boys felt oddly safe to finally get out of the mines, surrounded by light.

"We're home." Dipper called as he and Stan got home.

"Already?" his mother asked from the living room. "Is everything okay?"

"We're fine." Dipper said shortly, trudging upstairs with Stan. As Dipper went to his room to jot down those notes, Stan entered Mabel's room, where she was laying on her bed. Leaning on her bedpost was a pair of crutches.

On the floor, Chloe was playing with Waddles. Back in their time, Waddles had passed of old age years ago, and neither him nor Chloe had ever seen him so young and energetic. In any case, his cousin was clearly enjoying herself; this has been one of the things she'd been so excited to do in this time.

"Hey, you're still alive." Mabel said, smiling at him.

"You okay?" Chris asked from behind him. She was standing in the doorway with a glass of water in her hand.

"We almost didn't get away, but we'll both be fine." Stan told her. "Those things were mean. They were like cats."

"So I got bitten by a cat?" Mabel asked as Dipper came in, his open journal in his hand. He handed it to Mabel and she read the few lines about her furry assailant.

 _Shadowcats: Cat-like creatures that live in the old mines of Gravity Falls. They are middle sized, with black fur and glowing yellow eyes. Seem to be meat-eaters, but what prey can there be in the old mines? Extremely territorial; they bite sisters! Approach with caution. Weaknesses: Light_

"Light?" Mabel questioned.

"Yeah, it hurts them like crazy." Stan said.

"I'm pretty sure we thought them their lesson." Dipper said.

"What lesson?" Chris asked. Before anyone could answer, Mabel's phone rang. Mabel peered at the screen, huffed in annoyance and pressed the ignore button. The phone began ringing again the moment she set it down, at which point she relented and answered.

"Gideon, if you call me one more time...Yeah, he sure can, he just got back from taking on a whole pack of wild cats. I'm not dying, Gideon, calm down. No. Noooo. No, I still won't...Go to hell, you overgrown ladybug!" With that, she practically attacked the ignore button, wondering how Gideon had even gotten her phone number.

"Dipper." Kristen knocked from the other side of the door and handed Dipper the house phone. "Phone for you."

"Howdy, Dipper." Gideon greeted from the other end of the line. Somehow, Dipper wasn't surprised, and he privately wondered if he could get Blubbs and Durland to issue a restraining order against a kid.

"Bye, Gleeful." Dipper's voice was firm as he pushed the end-call button and handed the phone back to his mother, who looked outraged at this.

"Mason Joseph Pines!" she chided. She would have carried on had the doorbell not rang, calling her away.

"Ya know, I thought you two actually got along for a while." Dipper told Mabel. "Ya know, before he got all creepy and possessive."

"Yeah, but...then he went after you the way he did." Mabel said, now looking pensively at the phone in her hands. Part of her wanted to be friends with Gideon again, they were best friends for a short time, but how could she look past him trying to blow her and Dipper up with dynamite?

The phone rang again. "Hate to say this." Chris said, making the twins jump. They'd forgotten the three of them were there. "Maybe if you throw the kid a bone this once, he'll let up on the calls."

"Yeah, he's not my dad," Chloe said. "so you're not gonna end up with him or anything." Chloe's face fell as something accord to her, and she leaned over to Stan. "Right?" she whispered. Stan only shrugged.

Mabel mulled this over for a few seconds, concluding the they were right, and she felt too drained to protest anymore. She took a deep breath as she answered the phone. "Gideon? Hey. Listen, I'll make a deal with you. If I give you this one more chance – One. More. Chance. – will you stop calling me?" Everyone in the room could practically hear the joyous yelp that came from the other side of Mabel's line. "Hold it. I have three conditions. You ready?...Okay. First, the date has to be a double date, someone needs to make sure you don't pull those stunts again. No I don't. Second, it waits until I get better and until than, I don't want to her a word about it. Finally, if it doesn't work out, than that's it. No more obsessive phone calls, no more pet-names, no more following me to school or spying on me at lunch. Got it? Okay. I'll pick the others out and let you know. Bye."

As she hung up the phone, Mabel let out a breath, glad to be done with that. Still, she looked sheepishly at Dipper, feeling awful for, once again, hoisting her problems off on him. "Hey, Broseph? I don't suppose you'd wanna be one half of the other couple going on my date?"

To her surprise, Dipper smirked. "Try and stop me."

"Wait, really?" Mabel asked.

"Yeah. I'm not leaving you alone with that little creep." he said, but suddenly grew awkward. "So, uh, who do you have in mind for my date?"

"Oh, I'll find...Someone." Mabel said as she began flipping through the contacts on her phone. Candy. Grenda. Wendy. A devious-looking grin found it's way to her lips as she found the perfect match for her brother.

Pacifica.

* * *

Like that? I made it up myself. Also, I looked it up about Waddles. Pigs who are well-cared for can live up to twenty years or so, so unfortunately, Chloe would never get to meet a younger, more playful Waddles. He'd probably be pretty old by the time she was born. And yes, the kids swear (sparingly, but still), that's what teenagers do. Review.


	12. The Hearts Of Stars

**Chapter Ten: The Hearts Of Stars**

In some twisted way, Mabel had dreaded the day her leg healed, even if Dipper and Pacifica would be there to keep that little creep in line. There was still a tenderness in her lower leg, but it wasn't like she sprained her knee or something that would need more time, so she was basically okay and had no way out of this.

She stood in front of the full length mirror in her room. Despite all of the conditions and her own disinterest of top of that, Mabel still felt the obligation to at least look nice. Her hair was neatly brushed with a blue flower pin in it, and she wore one of her nicer sweaters; cyan with darker blue stars here and there.

"Ready?" Dipper asked from the doorway, and Mabel found herself groaning at his complete lack of effort in his wardrobe. It didn't even look like he brushed his hair.

"Really, Dipper?" Mabel asked. "I don't want to go and even I'm trying to look nice for it."

"Hey, I put a clean shirt on." Dipper defended, and Mabel stared him down. "And deodorant. Whadda you want? You said yourself it's not an actual date."

"Yeah, but if you want to impress Pacifica -" Mabel started.

"What?" Dipper asked flatly, his face heating up. "Are you using this to set me up?"

"Maybe." Mabel teased, as the doorbell rang downstairs. "That's them, let's go." she said and bolted out of the room before Dipper could protest anymore. He moaned to himself, but followed her.

Gideon was in a tux, of all things, and Dipper forgot his and Mabel's spat as he enjoyed the bewildered look on her face. This was before he noticed Pacifica. Her hair was up in a ponytail, and she was in a dark blue tee-shirt with a pink jacket. Immediately Dipper thought to himself that Mabel was right; he should have done a bit more for this.

"Hey guys." Pacifica said as Dipper and Mabel descended the stairs to meet them.

"Hey Pacifica." Mabel greeted. "Gideon."

"Dipper." Gideon's wide smile fell. "You're still not ready?" Dipper gave the kid an irritated look.

"It's fine with me." Pacifica shrugged. "I mean, it's Mabel and Gideon going on the date; we're just going to keep him in line, right?"

"Thank you." Dipper told her.

"Mabel, I promise." Gideon said. "I'll make everything up to you and if we have more dates in the future, we won't need chaperones."

Mabel looked down at him for a moment before turning to her attention back to Dipper and Pacifica. "So, where are we going? Are we still banned from the movie theater?"

"I'm pretty sure." Dipper said. "Maybe we can stop by at the diner?"

"You know, I've lived here my whole life and I've never set foot in there?" Pacifica said. "Way too greasy. I still have some standards."

"Well, think about it this way; you're on a double date with us," Dipper said, opening the door and holding it open for the others. "so your standards have already been lowered tonight."

"Haha." Pacifica returned dryly as she followed Mabel and Gideon out the door.

A short time later, Pacifica was picking at her plate of chili cheese fries warily, trying to get a helping on the cheap plastic fork that wouldn't end with melted goop spilling on her clothes. Her parents had relented in allowing her to go out with her friends tonight. If she came home in soiled cloths, they would probably not allow it again for a while. As for the food, she wasn't very sure of anything here, so she'd simply ordered the same thing as Dipper, who's judgment she trusted.

"So dumplin'," Gideon started. Mabel glanced up from her strawberry pancakes and rolled her eyes at the name. "Havin' a good time tonight?"

"About as good as can be expected." Mabel said in something of a mutter. She knew she outta be giving Gideon more of a fair chance, she was the one who'd set this up after all, but the whole thing made her feel claustrophobic and brought back the feeling of helplessness she'd felt on these dates before. She was now thankful that Dipper and Pacifica were here.

Her mood was lifted, though, by the spectacle of Pacifica trying and failing to keep melted cheese off of her shirt. The noise she made brought amused grins to the Pines twins faces; Mabel snickered and Dipper offered her a napkin, which she took gratefully.

"This stuff's a mess." Pacifica said, grinning in spite of herself as she wiped off her shirt.

"Good though." Dipper said as he scooped up the last of his chilli into a spork.

"Yeah, it actually is." she admitted. The four returned to an awkward silence as they returned to their meals. The food was gone within five minutes.

"Pacifica," Mabel said, breaking the silence. "I'm going to the bathroom, come with me?"

"Sure." Pacifica said, getting up and following Mabel to the restroom, leaving the boys alone.

"Hurry back, darlin'" Gideon called, and Dipper rolled his eyes at it. "Problem, Dipper?"

Dipper's response was dry and he didn't look at Gideon. "You tried to mutilate me with lamb-shears."

"Oh, water under the bridge, my friend." Gideon said cheerfully, ignoring Dipper's eerily calm mood.

"You tried to crush me with a giant robot." Dipper said, the tone his voice unchanging.

"Haven't you forgiven -" Gideon began to ask, but Dipper cut him off.

"You tried to blow us up with explosives." Dipper said, taking a break to suck the last of his soda from the straw. There was a moment of silence as Gideon waited for Dipper to continue. When he didn't, Gideon figured it was safe to speak.

"Dipper that's all in the past." Gideon said. "I'm not like that anymore."

"It's not that." Mabel said from inside her stall to Pacifica, who was leaning against it and feeling quite unclean. Public restrooms were disgusting. "It's knowing what he _would_ do. If those are the lengths he would go to..."

"Yeah." Pacifica said, nodding in understanding. "It's the same thing with my parents. I know they're trying and at least my mom's changed, but every time I do get in trouble, I can't stop thinking about that bell."

"Exactly." Mabel said as the toilet flushed, she emerged from the stall and walked over to the sink. She smiled at Pacifica through the mirror, which she returned with a small, friendly grin. "I'm glade you and Dipper are here with us. I don't know if I'd be able to take it if you weren't. By the way," she went on, her face taking on a mischievous look. "about you and Dipper..."

"What about me and Dipper?" Pacifica asked, her tone making it clear that she was unprepared to talk about this.

"C'mon, you know." Mabel pressed as she turned the sink off and grabbed a wad of paper towels.

"No I don't." Pacifica said firmly, clearly beginning to get flustered.

"Oh please, you got all dressed up for him, didn't you?" Mabel asked, tossing the soggy paper towels into the trash can.

"What, a girl can't just look nice when she hangs out with her friends? C-can we just drop this?" the other girl asked. Mabel shrugged. She supposed she couldn't fault the same logic she'd used on her brother earlier that night.

When the girls returned, they found the check on their table with Gideon insisting on paying the bill and Dipper saying that he'd better seeing as he was the only one who really wanted this date. As Gideon took care of the check, Dipper stood up and stretched.

"So, where to next?" he asked before giving a kitten-like sneeze. At the 'aww's he got from Gideon and the girls, he blushed and silently cursed his allergies. Pacifica smirked as she got an idea of where to go, something she'd been meaning to show them.

"Isn't it everything I said it would be and more?" she asked about an hour later, the wind playing with her hair as it blew.

"You did not lie." Mabel said, sounding entranced and leaning on the rail of the balcony. Dipper, Gideon and them were on a balcony in the back of what was once the Northwest mansion, which overlooked the whole town. The town was a small, loose cluster of beautiful lights in the night.

"Surprised the old man let us up here so easily." Gideon commented.

"Yeah, the gates are almost never closed anymore." Pacifica said. "He likes visitors."

"Ghost, if you could see things now." Dipper joked, and he and Pacifica shared a laugh at this. Mabel eyed Pacifica and gave her a knowing look. Unfortunately, she didn't seem to notice, so no funny reaction this time. Oh well.

"Hey, Pacifica?" Mabel asked, something suddenly dawning in her head.

"Hm?" she hummed as she continued to enjoy the view.

"You remember Weirdmageddon?" Mabel asked.

"Yeah, how could I forget?" Pacifica said, her smile falling, obviously not liking the memories.

"Well, what was your deal than?" Mabel asked, looking at her. Pacifica stopped and looked her in the eyes. Dipper watched with intrigue; he'd been wondering that for a while, too. Mabel continued. "I mean, I thought we were cool for a while, and you were really nice at your party...After the ghost, I mean. But during Weirdmageddon..."

Pacifica didn't answer right away. She knew very well why she'd acted out, and she regretted it. But how to tell them? For a moment, Mabel felt guilty for putting this on her. Pacifica seemed absent, with Gideon looking at her blankly the twins watching her with concern.

"Pacifica?" Dipper pressed gently.

"You guys really scared me back there." she said, keeping her gaze ahead. Recalling the sheer loneliness of it, she didn't dare chance a look at either of them. If she did, she would probably launch herself into their arms. "You...you've both saved my life before. I guess I felt safe with you two, and when you weren't there, I...I was so happy you were both okay. I'm sorry I gave you the wrong idea, but...that's the only way I knew how to deal with that kind of stuff then. You're my best friends."

"So you used aggression as a defense mechanism." Dipper realized. Meaning to ask him what any of that meant, Pacifica made the mistake of looking at him. She was right; she couldn't stop herself from tackling Dipper, locking her arms around his neck and holding onto him. After a few seconds of surprise, Dipper allowed his arms to encase her, pulling her closer. Mabel hugged her from behind and leaned on her back comfortingly. Pacifica gave a small smile. She felt so safe like this.

Gideon looked at this spectacle with guilt. He'd been considering what Dipper had said earlier, and the older boy was right. He might have changed, but Mabel had seen what he was willing to do to get his ends. Seeing the three of them, he came to two conclusions. The first was that he would probably never achieve the level of intimacy he saw between the trio before him. The second was that this was the first time all night that he'd seen Mabel smile. She wasn't having fun on this date. Gideon took a deep breath. He knew what he had to do, but he would probably hate himself tomorrow.

"Mabel?" he asked, uncertainly. "You're not havin' a good time, are ya? Wanna...call off the date?" This got Dipper and Mabel's attention. The kid looked miserable.

"Can we have a minute alone, guys?" Mabel asked. Dipper was clearly hesitant to leave his sister alone with Gideon, but Pacifica gently pulled him away saying they'll be right inside if he tries anything. Mabel sighed as Gideon moved to stand beside her. She didn't look at him when he started speaking.

"I'm sorry." Gideon said. "I...I just got so excited when I heard you were back, I guess I forgot what Dipper told me before about how you can't make someone love you."

"Gideon," Mabel started. "You know why it can't work between us, right? I know you've changed, but after everything you did to us, I just don't think I can trust you. I want to be able to trust you again, but how can I when I know the things you would do. What kind of relationship would that be? Don't you think we both deserve better?"

"Well, I'll show you." Gideon declared softly. "I'll prove to you that I can be trustworthy. Until than...friends?" he nervously extended his hand out to her, and was surprised when she smiled as she took it.

"Friends." she returned, shaking his hand. As she let go of his hand, she looked back out at the nearly full moon. "It's getting late. How about we just head home?"

"Yeah, just..." Gideon paused, his gaze lingering on the moon. "I'll be right there."

Not a minute later, Dipper appeared and came up to the spot where Mabel had just stood. "Mabel told us what you two talked about. You okay?" His tone was guarded, but empathetic.

"Dipper, is...is it supposed to hurt this much?" Gideon asked, now having to make an effort not to cry.

"For a while." Dipper said. "But if you work at it, I promise things'll get easier and before you know it, you'll be wondering why you ever liked her that way in the first place. She'll be more like the world's coolest sister to you."

Gideon smiled at the thought. Dipper and Wendy really were like brother and sister at times, and it was hard to believe Dipper had ever had romantic feelings for her at all. He sincerely hoped that, if not a romantic relationship, he and Mabel could reach that point one day.

* * *

Yeah know, I just thought of something. Why not do codes like the show did, giving hints about what's to come, say something else or throw something else into the mix? That could be fun. Let's try it. The first to decode it gets a shout-out in the next chapter. Review.

Tebob al rkfzlokp dl

Tebob wfkdba elopbp civ

dl xka xph qeb jxdmfe

Tebob al rkfzlokp dl

 **Hint** : Three Letters Back


	13. Soren

**Chapter Eleven: Soren**

The lush green of the grove looked strange after weeks of seeing the browning grass and changing leaves of the outside world. Mabel clicked off the tape recorder with the low wail playing, and her, Wendy, Pacifica and Dipper's ears now filled with birdsong and the sound of flowing water. In spite of how their last visit had ended, Mabel and Wendy had to admit it was beautiful.

The three unicorns they had met before were nowhere to be seen, though there was what looked like a foal drinking from the spring. A yearling, to be exact, and he looked a lot like Celestabellebethabelle with his white pelt and rainbow main, but closer inspection revealed a light blue something on his sides coming from his shoulders.

"Whoa." Dipper whispered, having never seen a real unicorn before. The suddenness of his voice made the thing jump and give what sounded more like a bleat than any horse noise.

"Humans?" the unicorn asked in a small, scared voice. "W-what are you –"

"You're back." a familiar voice said. It was Celestabellebethabelle walking into the grove from behind the waterfall. Dipper and Pacifica's eyes widened in wonder, neither paying much mind to Wendy clamping protective hands on their shoulders. That oversized pony had best not say a single word against them, or there'd be hell to pay.

"Our friends wanted to see you guys." Wendy said, giving the older unicorn a deep scowl. "We don't want trouble, but if you -"

"Well, you've seen us." Celestabellebethabelle interrupted and made a dismissive gesture with her hoof. "Now away you go."

Pacifica was surprised to see the effect this was having on Mabel. Yes, Celestabellebethabelle was being rather rude, but it was like she'd been betrayed or personally hurt by her. Dipper, his journal and a pen in hand, frowned at the unicorn. Figuring that he wouldn't get any information out of her, he instead turned to the yearling, who seemed to be cowering at the adult.

"Excuse me." Dipper said, approaching the skittish yearling, who jumped. Before anyone could process what happened, a gust of wind picked up, blinding everyone. All the while, there was this high, frightened cry. Once everyone could see again, they were stunned at what they saw.

Wings. The yearling had a pair of huge cyan wings that flapped a couple of times. The bursts of wind made the grass around him ripple. His ears flattened and he hurriedly backed away, clearly in a panic, into the spring. He trembled under Celestabellebethabelle's hard glare.

"I-it was an accident! I didn't mea -" the yearling stuttered, still trembling. Pacifica's eyes widened, recognizing this scene instantly. When Celestabellebethabelle snorted and reared up on her hind legs, Pacifica's thought process stopped and she ran foreword on instinct to shield the colt. Her shoulder erupted in pain as a hoof was slammed into it, and she was knocked into the little unicorn who stared at her with awe.

"Pacifica!" Dipper and Mabel yelled, rushing to her. Wendy made a beeline for Celestabellebethabelle. She grabbed a fistful on the unicorn's hair, yanking her head down and gaining a pained whinny from her. Wendy cringed, but endured the hard bite delivered to her arm and retaliated with a solid kick to Celestabellebethabelle's stomach. Wendy released her and she stumbled away on unsteady legs, disappearing behind the rocks and grumbling about how violent those girls were.

Wendy huffed angrily and turned back to see the younger trio and the yearling. Pacifica was still on the ground holding her shoulder, but attention was on the yearling who kept apologizing. Having anticipated a fight before coming here, Wendy took the first-aid kit out of Dipper's backpack.

"You okay, bud?" Wendy asked as she took an ice-bag from the kit and filled it with cold spring water.

"I think so." Pacifica answered half-truthfully. If she was completely honest, her whole arm seethed with pain.

"Dipper, look the other way," Wendy told him. "her shirt needs to come off."

"Sure." Dipper said, a pinkish color tainting his cheeks as he walked toward the spring.

"Um...excuse me." the colt said, coming up to lay down beside him. "You...You wanted something before?"

"Oh, yeah." Dipper said, suddenly remembering why they'd come here in the first place. He picked up his fallen journal, bushed the dirt off of a page, and flipped to the first clean page. "I'm looking to get as much information on unicorns as possible."

"Oh, I can help with that." the colt said, seeming happy to be of some use as Dipper took a pen out from his pocket and clicked it. "I've lived with them my whole life."

Dipper chuckled. "Well I'd hope so. You are one of them, aren't you."

"Actually, no." the colt said, his ears drooping in despair. "I was born with wings and strange powers, so the others don't like me. My mother didn't even give me a name." Dipper didn't speak at first, but he gave the thing a sympathetic look.

"Well, my friend back there doesn't have the best relationship with her parents either." he told him. "So, uh, do unicorns have powers?"

"A few." the colt said. "Unicorn heir can make shields against anything, and our horns let us talk to non-unicorns. I...I have other powers." He was quiet as he said that last part, as though he were revealing some shameful secret.

"Really?" Dipper asked, setting his pen to the journal at the ready. "Which ones?"

Back over with the girls, Pacifica hissed as the cool water touched her bare shoulder.

"Just relax." Wendy said, applying a faint pressure to the spot. "That's one nasty bruise."

"What even made you do that?" Mabel asked, giving her a concerned look. Pacifica pondered this; if Mabel Pines, of all people, was asking why than it must have been a weird move.

"I don't know. Something happened when I saw her about to hurt him." Pacifica spoke slowly and uncertainly, half-wondering why herself. "I couldn't just stand there and watch it happen."

The other girls must have taken her uncertainty another way, though, because Wendy frowned in worry. "You're parents never -" Knowing what Wendy was about to ask, Mabel's eyes widened in horror.

"No." Pacifica said quickly. Too quickly. "Well, not as much as everyone seems to think."

"Then they have done it?" Mabel asked, trying to fight off the tremble in her voice. She couldn't imagine such a thing. Their parents – or any adult, in fact – had never struck her or Dipper before, no matter how much trouble they ever got in.

"I only remember three times." Pacifica said. "The first when I was little, another a couple of years ago after that ghost, and the last was actually a few weeks ago." She remembered that night, when she'd been grounded for, as her father had put it, disregarding the rules about going straight home after school to begin her studies. After coming home that night, Pacifica had somehow plucked up her courage and told him off, things swiftly descended into a shouting match, and ended with a hard smack to her face. She silently thanked her mother; if she hadn't been so fixated on perfect, bruise-free looks, Pacifica's own childhood might have been far worse. Her mind snapped back to the bruise she did have, and Pacifica flinched as a worrying thought struck her. "Oh man, if they find out about this..."

"Um, e-excuse me?" the yearling slowly trotted up to the group. Dipper held on to his haunches, his other hand clamped tightly over his eyes. "I-I'm really sorry for everything I've caused. You didn't have to..." he trailed off, and decided to say something else. "My mother doesn't like my wings, I'm used to it. I can...I can help you, if you want."

"He has healing powers." Dipper said, feeling his way to the ground to sit. "He can fix her up."

"Oh, please." Pacifica asked, and presented the still large bruise on her shoulder. The cool water from Wendy had lessened it quite a bit, but if her parents saw it, she still would never be able to pass it off as an accident. She would hate to have to explain it and listen to her dad once again berate her choice of friends. There was a mild ache as the tip of the colt's horn touched her tender flesh, but it wasn't much.

Pacifica's eyes widened as a pink light engulfed her bruise and there was a sharp pain in the shoulder that only lasted a few seconds before dissolving into an almost blissful sensation. Pacifica couldn't help but close her eyes in relaxation, so the whole thing was over before she knew it. After a moment of disorientation, she noticed that her shoulder was now perfectly fine, with no sign that anything had happened at all. As she replaced her shirt, she called over to Dipper.

"Okay, Dipper, it's safe to look now." she said, and Dipper seemed thankful for this new freedom.

"Okay, he's told me as much as he can for now." Dipper said, placing his journal and pen back into his backpack.

"Hold on," Mabel said, and turned back to the colt. "What's your name?"

"I don't have one." he said, and the girls blinked in surprise. "Mother never gave me one since she never wanted me."

"Oh, that does it." Wendy declared, giving him a determined look. "You're coming with us."

"R-really?" the colt asked, his eyes sparkling with what seemed to be excitement.

"Wendy, are you sure about this?" Dipper asked. "Would it be safe for him?"

"Well, it's sure not safe for him here." she retorted.

"Would this count as kidnapping?" Pacifica whispered to Mabel, who looked back at where Celestabellebethabelle had disappeared. There was no sign of her. Did she really not care? Mabel just shrugged before she got an idea that brought a sparkle to her eyes.

"Those wings work, right?" she asked. "Can you fly?"

"Not really." the colt said. "Winged unicorns are really, really rare, so I've got no one to teach me. I've been watching birds, though, and it looks fun."

"Hey, lets get going." Wendy called, noting how low the sun was getting. "It's getting late."

The outside world was startling to the colt, and the first thing he did was rear and flap his wings in alarm. "Oh great Sky Goddess, Mother said that humans were ruining the outside world, but I never thought it was this bad!"

"Calm down, nothing's dying." Dipper reassured. "It's just fall. Leaves and plants start to die this time of year, but they'll come back in spring. This is just something that happens." Knowing that this was a common occurrence, or at least that there was no immediate danger, the colt calmed down.

"So...where will I live now?" the colt asked, feeling the brace of cold for the first time in his life. A frost had settled over Gravity Falls a few nights ago and the trees were now fully bare.

"I'm pretty sure our friend Soos could put you up for a while." Mabel said. She gave him a sweet smile as he stared longingly at the birds that flew overhead, wishing he could fly like them. "Hey, I just thought of a name for you." she beamed, and the colt looked at her, his ears perked up in intrigue. "How do you feel about Soren? Cuz I promise, one day you'll be such a great flier that those birds will wish they could fly half as good as you."

Dipper and the girls stopped as the colt reared in excitement and began prancing and bounding about, his wings flapping and fluttering in happiness. "Wow, what a day! I find friends who really like me, get away from those mean unicorns and go into this fascinating new world, and I even get a new name; I'm Soren!"

* * *

"What? More _Friendship Is Magic_ references?" Well, the show did it first. I would like to take this time to thank my OpenOfficeWriter system for it's copy-paste feature. Celestabellebethabelle's name is the cruelest fictional name since Runningnose from the _Warrior Cats_ books. Also, if anyone has ideas for codes, I'd love to here them! Review.

Neros dluow worg ot emoceb eon fo eht tsom lufrewop sgnieb in Yitvarg Sllaf dna fles-detnioppa naidraug fo sih namuh sdneirf. Ellebahtebellebatselec dluow evah eht evren ot garb tuoba ti ot reveohw dluow netsil.

 **Hint** : Backwards


	14. Falling Stars

**Chapter Twelve: Falling Stars**

"Wa-wa-wait!" Dipper stuttered, hardly daring to believe what he'd just heard. He and Mabel were at the Mystery Shack on an off day to visit Soos, their brand new winter attire thrown around the room; coming from California, neither was used to the heavy coats, gloves and scarves, and it was nice to be able to move again.

"Huh." Ford's voice came from the speaker phone as Stan's voice chuckled in the background. They would be arriving tomorrow for the holiday, and considering certain circumstances, had decided to call ahead of time, just to make sure everything was okay. "He's taking it better than you thought."

"Calm down there, slick." Stan called. "I said the journals are still at the shack."

"Where are they?" Dipper cut him off excitedly. "I thought you took them with you!"

"We left them with Soos." Ford explained. "If not for ideas for the shack, than just for safe keeping."

"Oh yeah, sorry, dude." Soos said, scratching the back of his neck. "I forgot all about those books. They should still be in my room if you -" Dipper bolted off excitedly into another room before Soos could finish talking.

"Dipper?" Stan asked. He must have heard the cutoff and the pounding of sneakers on wood.

"He went to go find them." Mabel reported.

"He is like me." Ford said in a musing way. "Mabel, are you still here?"

"Yeah Grunkle Ford, I'm here." Mabel said, and at that moment she head her brother yelp, a series of crashes and a yell of 'I'm okay!'. "I'm pretty sure Dipper just fell down the stairs."

"Should of gotten those things carpeted." Ford muttered, clearly to himself, but both Soos and Mabel could hear him clearly.

"By the way," Stan started, sounding like he'd just been reminded of something. "Soos, have you been down in the basement at all?"

"Uh, no sir." Soos said. "I always felt like whatever that was down there was your business and I could never remember the code anyway."

"How's the Shack?" Stan asked.

"Great, Mr. Pines!" Soos beamed, all trace of his previous nervousness gone. "I really went all out with it. New base, fresh paint, everything! Wait till ya see it!"

Stan chuckled. "Alright, alright, sheesh. I'll definitely stop by to take a look." That might not have been the kindest way of saying it, but there was that unmistakeable fondness in his voice that all three of them, including Dipper, had missed. "Mabel, you holdin' up okay?"

Mabel's fond, nostalgic grin disappeared, replaced with a fearful, tiered look and she was glade they couldn't see it. "I...I'm okay."

"It don't sound like it." Again, maybe not the best choice of words, but the gentleness in Ford's tone was enough to tell Mabel that she was safe. None of them would allow harm to come to her, especially Dipper. "We know Bill's been telling you lies. What's he been telling you?"

Mabel contemplate this. She loved her Grunkles dearly, but this was really something that should stay between her and Dipper. There really was no reason to worry them. At least, that's what she told herself. "I...can't tell you right now."

Ford gave a brief hum, clearly having expected this to go differently. Thankfully, though, he said "Alright, we'll find out soon enough. Just don't listen to anything he tells you."

Again, the similarities between Ford and Dipper were striking; she'd heard it from her brother, same words, same tone, when she first told him about it around a month ago. Mabel gave a heavy, tiered sigh. "Okay, I won't." Now eager for a new topic, Mabel continued. "So...How's the inn?"

"Oh, it's very nice. We'll be leaving after breakfast, so we should be seeing you kids around noon tomorrow." Ford said.

"Can't wait." Mabel said with a grin.

"Well, we need to go." Ford said.

"We'll see ya tomorrow, pumpkin." Stan put in.

"Okay, bye. Bye from Dipper, too." Mabel said.

"Bye, Mr. Pineses." Soos said.

"See ya in a couple days, Soos." Stan said. The phone hang up from the other side, and Mabel clicked the speaker phone off.

"They're here! They're all here!" Dipper's voice came from the other room and they saw him just reappearing from the other room. In his hands was a stack of familiar books. He carefully set the stack down on the floor and began redressing in his winter clothes. "Mabel, I've gotta get home and put these in a safe place. See ya at dinner, kay?"

"Okay." Mabel said. "Oh, and Stan and Ford said they'd -" but she was cut off by the slamming of the front door after Dipper bolted out into a gust of icy wind, his coat barely even zipped. Their mom would be livid. "See ya tomorrow." she finished, honestly more annoyed than anything else.

"Hey, you guys gonna introduce Chris and those kids to them?" Soos asked, and Mabel thought about this for a moment.

"They do have something to do with this, so I guess we should." Mabel told him.

"Ya know, I don't think they ever told us exactly what they were going to do." Soos said. "Want me to call them over here to get things straight?"

"No." Mabel said, peering out the window to the snowfall. She was pretty sure that Chris, the younger Stan and Chloe had grown up in Gravity Falls back in their time so they were probably more used to snow than she was. The snow might not have been sticking yet, but still. "We'll get the whole story tomorrow when they meet Grunkle Stan and Ford."

Mabel was back in her room, once again in a world of gray. She took in a breath, forcing herself to calm down. Bill appeared in a flash on light.

"Hey there, Shooting Star." he greeted, twirling his cane in his hands. "I hear ol' Fez and Sixer are coming home." Mabel ignored him, as par Dipper and Ford's warnings. Bill continued. "Aw, come on. No news for your ol buddy Bill? And after I made you that wish-granting bubble, too. Well, I guess I really shouldn't be surprised there. I mean, you are pretty used to being an ingrate." Mabel clinched her fists and turned away. Bill floated into her line of sight once more, and she turned away again. "Not in the mood to talk? That's fine. But remember this: Shooting stars are the most beautiful when they fall." He was silent. Mabel glanced at him with irritation before she rolled her eyes.

There was a loud flicking sound, like the snapping of fingers, and Mabel awoke with a hard flinch and a gasp. It was still night, and she shrank further under her blanket, partly from the cold and partly from fear. She didn't fall back asleep.

The earlier part of that morning was spent in a tired daze for her. She vaguely noticed her parents attempts to talk to her, or when Chris, Stan and Chloe showed up, as Dipper and her had requested last night. Dipper, in a familiar way, searched the pages of the third journal for something to cheer her up. He eventually managed the get a smile out of her as they reminisced about the gnomes, height-altering crystals and escaping dinosaurs in the old mines.

Mabel's smile grew when, apparently hearing that he was being talked about, Waddles leaped off his spot on the couch and trotted up to Mabel, so that he and Dipper flanked her. He rested his hoof on her lap and pressed his snout to her face in a sort of kiss. She laughed, and hugged the pig with one arm, Dipper with the other. No one seemed to notice the doorbell ringing until a familiar voice reached their ears.

"Hey, Joey. Howya been?"

"Uncle Stan." Joe's voice came. "And you must be Ford."

"Guilty as charged." Ford's voice came.

Waddles' ears perked up and he began excitedly charging to the living room. When he showed no sighs of stopping, Stan held his hands out in front of himself defensively, Waddles coming right at him. "Waddles, no. Down! Sit! Stay! Oof!" The pig tackled Stan and began licking him happily. Stan, however, was far from. "Rugh! Stop it! Down boy, bad pig!"

"Stan! Ford!" the kids yelled, running after Waddles. Stan was relieved when Waddles finally hopped off of him, only to have the wind knocked out of him a moment later when Mabel clung to him. Stan smiled and returned the hug with a familiar, "Hey there, kiddo." Ford and Dipper said nothing, but were clearly delighted to see each other by the wide smiles on their faces. After a moment, the kids released their Grunkles only to switch.

"Mabel," Ford said as he released her from their hug. Meanwhile, as opposed to a hug, Dipper found himself in a combination of a head-lock and a noogie from Stan. "How are you?" His smile slowly faded as he took in her tired expression and the slight darkness under her eyes. What was going on? This wasn't the bubbly little girl he'd seen off at the bus stop two years ago. "Bill?"

"Bill." Dipper answered for Mabel, the playful exchange between him and Stan now over. Stan looked on with an aggravated expression. Not only was that Bill back, but he was, once again, going after his family. Apparently, the guy never learned.

"Stan," Kristen said. "Ford, there are a few people you need to meet in the living room." When the adults got to the living room, Stan and Ford were intrigued to find a pair of very familiar looking kids sitting on the couch. At the end was an older girl who was petting Waddles, who was now snoozing on her lap. The younger kids looked so much like Dipper and Mabel when they were younger.

"Hello." The younger girl grinned and waved at them, making her look even more like Mabel. The boy glanced up at them silently and the older girl, despite her relaxed posture, watched them keenly.

"Uncle Stan, Uncle Ford." Joe said, gesturing to the kids. "Meet Chrystal, Stan and Chloe; your great-great nieces and nephew."

"Time-travel?" Ford guessed, not missing a beat and his bother gave himself a little smile, touched that Dipper would name his kid after him.

"Yep." Chris answered, and she proceeded to retell their story. At some point during in the story, Kristen got up to bring two mugs of hot coffee for the older Pines twins, which they took gratefully. After the story concluded, the elder Stan smirked at Dipper and nudged him. "Hehe. Looks like you and Wendy finally tied the knot, eh?"

"No." Chloe said, sounding absent. "Him and Aunt –"

"CHLOE!" Chris and the younger Stan's hands flew over her mouth so forcefully, she all but fell over.

"You wanna risk our existence?" Chris yelled.

"So what are you guys supposed to do anyway?" Dipper asked.

"Actually, Dad only needed one of us to go." Chris said. "Stan – our Stan – said that he started this, so he had to try to fix it, and I came back to protect him."

"I was just bored." Chloe chirped happily, still constricted in her cousins' arms. The older Stan and Ford exchanged troubled looks at her wide grin. It only highlighted the difference between the Mabel slumped in a chair, putting effort into giving a small smile, and the happy child they both remembered who never had to try to smile. The brothers seemed to have the same thought at this; Bill would pay dearly.

"We don't really know if there's anything we can do." Chris said, "but we're here if you need us."

"Well, Stanley and I will be here for a couple of days. We need to defeat him in that time." Ford said. "I have an idea of how to it, but it would be taking a huge risk, so it'll be plan B."

"So what's plan A?" Dipper asked.

"Are you sure about this?" Dipper whispered, his tone more unsure than scared. It was night and he, Stan, Ford and Chris were in Mabel's room, where she was sleeping. Dipper was holding the third journal, the page with the incantation to enter the mindscape open. "We never went over this with her."

"I hate to keep this from her," Ford started. "but if she knew about it, she would never be able to fall asleep, and it looks like she needed it anyway." He turned to Chris, who was sitting on the far side of the room. "You'll keep watch out here, right?"

"Sure thing." Chris said, stifling a yawn.

"I don't like it either, kid." Stan said, putting a hand on his shoulder. "But think what'll happen to her if we let Bill keep pickin' on her like he's been." He and Ford placed their hands on her forehead, leaving a small space for Dipper's. "Now you commin' or what?"

Dipper sighed in defeat, and placed his hand on the free spot on his sister's forehead. He began reading the incantation. "Videntus omnium. Magister mentium. Magnesium ad hominem. Magnum opus. Habeas corpus! Inceptus Nolanus overratus! Magister mentium! Magister mentium! Magister mentium!"

One by one, their eyes went blue. Once the incantation was complete, a blue light flashed, blinding Chris. When her vision returned, Dipper and the Pines brothers were unconscious.

* * *

I'm doing a sweep-through of the existing chapters so far. Anyone who wants, tell me about areas you feel are lacking, like descriptions, and please point out all the typos you can. I know there's a lot of them. Oh, and please PM me about them; no use clogging up the review section. Review.

4-18-5-1-13-19 1-14-4 18-5-1-12-9-20-25

18-5-1-12-9-20-25 1-14-4 4-18-5-1-13-19

23-9-18-9-19 20-8-5 20-18-21-5 12-9-12-5

6-15-18 3-9-16-8-5-18-19 18-5-7-9-13-5

 **Hint** : Match the numbers to letters


	15. Return To The Mindscape

**Chapter Thirteen: Return To The Mindscape**

As Stan, Ford and Dipper regained their sight from the flash, only Dipper knew what to expect; a world of pink and purple, talking cat judges and flying sweaters. The idea made his stomach turn over. When his vision returned, he received a big surprise. There were no overly bright colors, but it wasn't a world of gray, either.

It was a natural landscape. They were standing in a meadow of green grass, with hills rolling in the distance. If one looked a bit closer, they would see odd animals that looked like imaginative hybrids; an owl with a cat head, tail and claws, a gazelle with tiger stripes who flitted on giant dragonfly wings, and a fox with rabbit ears. Dipper smiled fondly at this, with a hint of relief; now that was the Mabel he knew.

"Dipper?" his eyes widened at the voice that spoke his name. Behind him and his Grunkles was Mabel.

"Mabel?" Ford asked, cocking an eyebrow in confusion. "How..."

"It's my mind." Mabel said casually. "I can do whatever I want, remember?"

"Who told you that?" Ford asked.

"Dipper did." she said.

"Actually, Stan did." Dipper retorted, but stopped to think. "At least, I think it was Stan. The Stan I met in a memory told me about it."

"And he was aware of his nature as a figment?" Ford asked, clearly intrigued.

"I guess." Dipper shrugged, only just realizing that he had never questioned this before. Maybe because there were other things to worry about at the time.

"Anything we want, huh?" Stan asked, smirking to himself and clearly thinking something up. "Ford, you thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?"

"Probably not." Ford admitted. Stan clinched his eyes and was instantly enveloped in a white light. When it lifted, in Stan's place stood a little boy, maybe about eleven or twelve, with messy hair, a red and white striped shirt, band-aids and a missing tooth. The kid looked ecstatic and Ford smirked in amusement.

"Woo-hoo!" the boy cheered, pumping his fists into the air. "I'm young again! So-long back pains and legal liabilities; your clutches on Stanley Pines are over! Temporarily!"

"Oh, what the heck?" Ford asked himself as he mimicked Stan's eye clinching and was also engulfed in light and replaced with a boy who looked a great deal like the younger Stan. A brown jacket, glasses, no band-aids, and of coarse, those six fingered hands. He liked to think he was in good shape for his early sixties, but it still felt great being a kid again. The newly young Ford smiled as he looked himself over, and his brother beamed proudly.

"Way to dream big there, guys." Dipper smirked as he and Mabel grinned at the spectacle.

"Wouldn't that be dreaming small?" Mabel joked, and Dipper playfully shoved her with his elbow.

"Hey Ford, watch me do a handstand!" Stan said excitedly.

"You were never able to do a handstand." Ford told him. Stan didn't seem to be listening as he planted his hands firmly on the ground and managed a few seconds of a handstand before falling foreword. Seeing his brother shaking his head clear from some kind of impact and laying on the ground from something he was warned not to try, Ford laughed. "Okay, now it really is like the old days."

"So what are you guys doing here?" Mabel asked.

"Tracking down Bill." Dipper answered. "Ford said if we can beat him here, we probably wouldn't need to resort to whatever plan B is."

"Well, we won't find him just standing around." Mabel said and started toward a cluster of woods not far from where they were. Dipper followed her.

"Race ya." Stan challenged, and he and Ford overtook them and raced through the tall grass.

"This is your mindscape?" Dipper asked, eying a pair of tiger-stripped gazelles as they bounded and flitted along. "Doesn't look anything like Stan's."

"Well, I'll bet your mindscape is a library or something." Mabel teased. "Everything stored in books and things."

"You know what, that would be your fault. You and your...magic scrapbook." Dipper shot back, though in a playful way.

"I like my scrapbook." Mabel defended, equally playfully.

"Hey, speaking of that, what happened here?" he asked. "I mean, it looks a lot better than that bubble world, but it's still weird."

"That place wasn't a mind, it was..." Mabel paused, unsure of how to phrase what Mabeland had been. "Well, it wasn't a mind. Actually, I have no idea what I was thinking with that. All those bright colors and loud songs."

"Didn't you used to like that stuff?" Dipper asked.

"Yeah. Guess I just kinda grew out of it." Mabel said as she watched a flock of jay-falcon hybrid birds flying overhead. "And anyway, I was just trying too hard to ignore things. I mean, you don't seriously think I'd want some nineties stereotype for a brother, do you? I was just trying to hurt you because you hurt me."

"I didn't mean to." Dipper said, when something occurred to him. "You seem a lot more self-aware than usual."

"It's the mind, so I made myself smart." the girl said, giving him something of a sheepish look.

"What?" Dipper asked. He stopped, as did Mabel. "You are smart."

"Well, I can't be that smart." Mabel said, looking away from him. "I'm listening to what Bill tells me. I know I shouldn't trust him, but I can't ignore what he says." Dipper placed a hand on her shoulder, and the wind suddenly picked up. There was a coolness in the air and a loud cackle that sent a chill down the brother and sister's spines. Bill appeared before them, giant and looming.

"Bill." Dipper whispered threateningly, his hand tightening on his sister's shoulder.

"Hey there, Pine Tree? Miss me this time?" Bill asked.

"What do you want?" Dipper demanded.

"Not even gonna say hi?" Bill asked, pretending to be hurt. "Maybe Shooting Star was right to treat you like she does. By the way, how's it feel to know your own kid is the whole reason I'm back."

"He said it was a mistake." Dipper defended, but this did raise a question for him; why did his future-self never warn them?

"Hey!" The three of them turned to the 'hey' seeing the still-young Stan, who seemed to be flying, with a deep scowl on his face and charging at Bill. In a rather familiar scene, the kid aimed a fist directly at Bill's eye. Rather than being deflected, though, Bill simply grabbed Stan in two fingers, halting him like he was nothing. Bill tutted condescendingly.

"Ah, Stanley Pines." Bill said, and Dipper and Mabel's hearts leaped when his eye flashed bright red, now furious. "You almost got me killed, you little brat."

"And I'd do it again!" Stan spat and returned the look defiantly, the expression suiting him now that he was a child.

"That's what I'm worried about." Bill said, and began squeezing Stan as if he were a grape. Stan cringed in pain, clearly struggling not to scream.

"Stan!" Dipper and Mabel tensed up, ready to attack Bill, but a reddish laser appeared from nowhere and shot Bill in the hand. He dropped Stan, who caught himself in flight, and waved his hand around like he'd been burned.

Ford flew up between Stan and Bill, his hand smoking and wearing the same expression Stan used to wear when he defended Ford from those bullies decades ago. When Bill saw this, he gave a short, low laugh. "Well, well. Looks like you too finally came to an understanding. And after all the hard work I put in, too." Stan and Ford flew over to Dipper and Mabel, planting themselves in front of them, all four of them still glaring up at the triangle. Ya know, I think a change of scene is in order."

With that, there was a flash, blinding the Pines's once more. Indeed, when the light dimmed, the four found the bright field that Mabel's mindscape had been was gone. Rather, there was a vast space-like void with star-fields, galaxies and nebulas. Bill and the Pines's faced one another on what seemed to be a flouting platform in the center of the void.

"You Pines's have always been trouble." Bill seethed, his body bright red and there were blue flames flaring from his hands. Dipper and Mabel shivered, the image before them bringing up frightening memories, but they stood their ground. Stan and Ford just continued to glare up at him.

"Dipper." Mabel whispered to him, her hand rummaging around in her pants pocket. "Reach into your pocket. We have help."

Dipper did so, and felt a small sphere that wasn't there before. He pulled out a small blue and green ball, about the size of a ping-pong ball. Instantly recognizing the balls, Dipper and Mabel grinned knowingly at each other.

"Battle Mode!" the twins yelled as they threw the balls into the air and they morphed into different creatures. Dipper's ball transformed into what appeared to be a feathered dragon, and Mabel's became a rabbit-eared fox, like the one from her field.

"What is that?" Ford asked.

"Some kind of show that was on before you came back through the portal." Stan said, his words sounding quite strange coming from the mouth of a child. "It was everywhere when they were little."

"Digizard!" Dipper yelled, "Firestream!" The dragon drew it's head back, it's throat seeming to glow with power before it unleashed what looked like a river of glowing lava. Bill held up a hand, stopping the attack in it's tracks before sending it right back at Digizard, who fell to the ground with a wail of pain.

"Pixeleon, Superfang!" Mabel called. The fox came up behind Bill and clamped its fangs firmly into his side. Bill simply acted like he'd be pricked by something, and blasted the fox off of him so that it fell to the ground beside Digizard. The two began to disintegrate into pixels. Mabel, horrified, called Pixeleon's name and Dipper continued to glare at Bill.

Seeing the four Pines's gearing up for more attacks, Bill forced the space-like place away, giving way to a world of white. Mabel and the boys looked around, now feeling powerless. Mabel tried to come up with something, but Bill glared at her, seeming to leave her paralyzed.

"This is still the mindscape, kids." Bill told them. "It's still under my control, and I'm not playing games anymore."

"What do you want, Cipher?" Ford asked.

"Revenge." Bill told him, and he eye flitted between Stan and Ford. "You two weren't supposed to pull things toher like that. Imagine going up against you two and being tricked by the dumb one. It's humiliating, and I'll make sure you all pay." Bill took on an almost serene stance and was surrounded by a familiar circle who's symbols lite up in turn. "The mindscape is my domain. The only way to stop me is to allow me to return to the physical plane." The last couple of words echoed ominously as he disappeared in yet another flash of light.

Mabel jolted awake, her mind reeling. It was morning. The first thing she noticed, rubbing her eyes, was Chris sitting in a chair, sleeping. The next thing she noticed were the groans of her brother and Grunkles, who were sprawled out on the floor near her bed.

"So what now?" Mabel asked as they looked up at her. Dipper shook his head clear and Stan seemed disappointed to be back in his old, creaky body.

"Plan B." Ford said, looking serious as he got to his feet. "We'll need to gather the others. It's time for the Zodiac."

* * *

I love the mindscape. Bye-bye, any and all logic, you not be missed. I know people are bound to be split on how tame this feels, being Mabel and all, but admit it; you weren't expecting it. Next up, the Zodiac in action...Review.

5-22-5-18-25-15-14-5 4-15-19-5 20-8-10-14-7-19 1-7-1-9-14-19-20 20-8-5-9-19 2-5-20-20-5-18 10-21-4-7-13-5-14-20 15-14-3-5 9-14 1 23-8-9-13-5

 **Hint** : Match Numbers To Letters


	16. The Zodiac

**Chapter Fourteen: The Zodiac**

"Now what won't you do?" Ford asked for what had to be the fifth time in the passed hour. He and Stan were in Stan's car, driving to the Mystery Shack, which would be the meeting spot. Dipper and Mabel had gone off on their own to gather some of the others.

"I won't let go of your hand no matter how annoyed I am by you." Stan droned, clearly beginning to get aggravated. It reminded him of his teenage years, when whenever he got in trouble, his father would keep him up for hours repeating what he did wrong and that he won't be stupid anymore. He'd hated it than, and he hated it now. "I got it, can we be done, now?"

" _I've_ got it, can we be _finished_ now." Ford corrected, but paused when he saw the angry look Stan was giving him. That had always been one of his more annoying habits, Ford admitted, and he'd been working on it for years. After his six-fingered hands, that habit had been the biggest reason he'd been bullied as a child, kids saying he always talked in the most condescending and punchable way possible. "Sorry." Ford said quickly, turning his eyes back to the road. Not a minute later, the woods ended and the Mystery Shack came into view.

Stan gave an impressed whistle as they got out of the car, seeing the vastly improved shack. "Soos really cleaned this place up. Looks brand new."

Soos must have heard them, because before Stan knew it he was being hugged so tightly that Soos was lifting him clear off the ground.

"Stan!" Soos cried joyously. "I knew you'd come back!"

"I told ya I'd see ya in a couple of days." Stan tried to reason. As aggravating as that was, Stan couldn't stop the fond look that came to his face; it was nice to be this appreciated and Soos really did deserve it. Meanwhile, Ford's ribs were beginning to ache from trying not to laugh at the scene before him.

A block or so away from his house, Dipper was holding a handful of small pebbles and eying Pacifica's window. He'd already tried the direct approach, and her dad had literally slammed the door in his face before he could get a single word out. He hated resorting to something like this, but there wasn't much time to think of anything else, so he started tossing the pebbles. Tap, tap, tap, tap. Pacifica opened the window and looked at him like he was crazy.

"Hey, Pacifica," Dipper called up to her, smiling despite the seriousness of this situation. "Check it out, we're a cheesy eighties movie!" Pacifica laughed.

"Dork!" she called down to him playfully. "What's going on?"

Dipper's grin suddenly plummeted as he remembered why he was there. "Oh, bad news. Bill's coming back."

Pacifica's smile also fell as he said this. Her mind felt numb at the news, but she managed a shaky "I-I be right down."

Dipper didn't have to wait long. She came running out of the door with her father behind her. "What's going on here?" he demanded.

"Nothing." Pacifica answered shortly, and it seemed as though they'd just gone through a short fight. "See ya in a bit!" Dipper and Pacifica laughed as they ran. Preston had no idea what was happening, he was angry and seeing his daughter running off with the Pines boy certainly did nothing for his mood.

Wendy and Robbie had been easy to get a hold of. All Mabel had had to do was call Wendy and she said she and Robbie would be there as soon as they could. Mabel was now knocking on the Gleeful's door, thinking that if Gideon tried anything, she'd simply punch him. Bud answered the door.

"Mr. Gleeful, I need to talk to Gideon. It's an emergency." she told him.

"Oh my." Bud said, clearly worried, but Mabel thought that he sure wasn't taking this seriously as he took his sweet time. If only she could actually tell them, than he'd know that time was of the essences. "Gideon!" he called into the house. "Ms. Pines is here, she needs to talk to you. Says it's an emergency."

Gideon ran up to them, looking at her with curiosity. Had no one told him, yet? She whispered it into his ear so as not to alarm Bud, and he blanched. "Dad, we need to go." Gideon told his father quickly, and the pair ran off without another word, to which Bud shrugged his shoulders. A bit rude, but he supposed if it was an emergency...

During this time, Ford was driving up to the mansion. Stan was back at the shack, where the others were all to gather. Soos was very eager to show Stan around the new and improved Mystery Shack, and who was he to deny him that? It was his job to get Fiddleford.

Halfway up the hill, Ford slammed his foot on the breaks, causing the car to jerk to a stop, when the man seemed to jump out of nowhere and jumped on the hood in a rather animalistic display. Ford still wasn't used to seeing his old friend this way, so he was a bit unbalanced for a moment. "Get in, Fiddleford." Ford told him, their eye contact maintained through Stan's windshield.

It had been a while since the Mystery Shack had seen so many people on an off-day. Apart from the ten people required for the Zodiac, so were Chris, the younger Stan and Chloe, and Joe and Kristen insisted on being there.

"Your...future kids?" Pacifica asked Mabel, eying Chloe interestedly. The moment Dipper had arrived with her, Chris ran into another room like her life depended on it, muttering something about how she should have seen this coming. The girls were wearing their respective sweaters with the arms tide loosely around their necks, the symbols facing outward, as they had both outgrown the sweaters.

"Yup." Mabel chirped happily. Chloe gave an identical look to Pacifica, increasing the resemblance between the girls. "Over there," Mabel went on, pointing at the younger Stan who was sitting under a window, being very quiet and looking to be in deep thought. "that's the new Stan, Dipper's son."

"He looks a lot like him." Pacifica mused, suddenly feeling strange about this.

"I'm back." Chris announced as she came back down the stairs, now sporting a pair of shades.

"This is Chris, his sister." Mabel said, seeming unaware of the sudden awkwardness between the other two girls. Pacifica didn't know why, but the knowledge of Dipper's kids made her uneasy.

"Chris?" Pacifica asked, pretty sure that Mabel had used the word 'sister' just now. "Is that short for something?"

"Crystal." Chris said shortly.

"Crystal Pines." Pacifica managed a polite smile. "That's a pretty name."

"Yeah, my mom thinks so, too." Chris said, her attention shifting to her clearly troubled brother. "Sorry, Pacifica, I need to take care of this." she said hastily and hurried over to Stan.

"Did I ever tell her my name?" Pacifica asked.

"Maybe she knows you in the future." Mabel said, and giggled as a particularly entertaining thought occurred to her. "Maybe you're her and Stan's mom."

"Will you knock that off?" Pacifica asked agitatedly, her cheeks turning a deep red. "He doesn't feel that way about me and I don't feel that way about him."

"Liar." Mabel teased, and Pacifica was unamused. Mabel couldn't know it, but such thoughts would be nagging at the back of Pacifica's mind for the rest of the day.

Stan stared out the window, his eyes drooping. He didn't sleep last night and was tiered. He'd heard from Chris that Ford said that Bill said something about returning to the physical realm. Another thing he remembered was the words Dipper had told him before, words that he'd reluctantly taken to heart.

 _Sometimes, you need a little risk to help get you going._

A sudden shouting of his name made him jump. Chris was looking at him with concern.

"What's going on, bro?" she asked gently. Stan couldn't bring himself to tell her, he just hugged her; Stan knew what he had to do, and it scared him more than anything ever had before. He just needed his sister right now. Chris didn't press, she just hugged him back.

In the kitchen, the older Stan, wearing his old fez again, Joe and Kristen were sitting around the table, where Stan was filling Joe and Kristen in on everything that had happened in the mindscape. The whole thing was troubling to them. Powerful dream demons? Going into dreams? A zodiac?

"Joe," Kristen asked, looking seriously down at the table. "Was it a mistake to come up here? It seems to just get more and more dangerous in this town."

Joe didn't get to reply before Stan cut in. "It might be dangerous, but Dipper and Mabel had it under their belts when they were twelve. Those kids can more than take care of themselves."

Joe stayed quiet for a while, as he thought about Dipper. He'd been depressed the last couple of summers he didn't get to come up here, and they'd both be heartbroken to have to leave for good. Still, he wife was right; it was dangerous. He sighed heavily. "We'll see how this goes. Than we'll talk it over."

"Okay." Kristen had, and Joe kissed her on the forehead. Just than, Ford and Dipper came in the door from the backyard. One of the more welcome additions to the shack that Soos had made was a large concrete patio for his grandma, where the circle was drawn.

"The zodiac is set up." Ford said. "Now, we wait."

"For what?" Dipper asked.

"Bill." Ford answered.

"Someone mention me?" Everyone froze up at the sound of Bill's voice. Wendy and Chris came running into the kitchen in a panic.

"Bill ambushed us!" Wendy said.

"He's got Stan." Chris said, looking very panicked. "Is the thing ready yet?"

"We just finished." Dipper said quickly and yelled into the room. "Everyone, the zodiac's ready! Take your places!"

From the other room, the others flooded the kitchen and ran out to the circle. Sure to everyone's expectations, Bill wasn't far behind and the memories made Dipper's stomach flip over. Young Stan looked strange with those eyes and that deranged grin.

Both sets of Pines's twins remained in the kitchen facing him. Dipper and Mabel looked at each other and nodded. "Stan, Ford, go out to the circle. We'll deal with him."

"What?" Stan asked.

"If we do this fast, maybe he won't have to return to his physical form." Dipper said. Reluctantly, the older Pines's left, leaving Dipper, Mabel and Bill alone.

"Heh." Bill scoffed. "Just like old times, eh Pine Tree? Shooting Star? Hey, whadda ya get when you have two pine cones and a piece of space rock? Nothing of value! Ahahaha!"

"What did you do to Stan?" Mabel demanded.

"Me? Not a thing. It was all him." Bill said, sauntering over to a drawer and taking out a knife. Dipper and Mabel watched closely, trying to keep calm. "The kid wanted me to take his body. He fell asleep in his sister's arms pretty quickly, called me up in his dream and volunteered his body for me. You two really outta be proud; your kids not only helped me resume my reign, but brought me back here so I can have more time to set everything back to the way it was. First thing's first, though. Those miserable uncles of yours have to go."

"You touch our uncles and we'll –" Dipper yelled.

"You'll what, Pine Tree?" Bill asked, pointing the blade at him threateningly. With Bill's attention focused on him, Mabel was free to sneak up behind him and push him to the ground, an easy feat with the size difference, and Bill dropped the knife. After a moment of desperate grabbing, he almost reclaimed the weapon as Dipper grabbed for it, too.

Taking advantage of the boy's outstretched hand, Bill took his wrist. Just as Mabel was pulling Bill away, Dipper screamed as he arm erupted in pain and began to bleed heavily. Down Dipper's forearm was now a long, clean gash. By reflex, Dipper withdrew, holding his injured arm, and giving Bill his opening.

"Dipper!" Mabel yelled, and she gave Bill an icy stare, no longer caring that he was in a little boys' body. Unable to take anymore, Mabel grabbed Bill by the back of his shirt, pushing him to the floor. When he wouldn't give up the knife, Mabel stomped on his hand and he screamed; that was the wrong kind of pain. Mabel only casually wondered if she'd done any permanent damage to Stan's hand, but he couldn't grab the knife anymore which was a plus. Before Bill could even move to get up, Mabel turned him on his back and punched him hard, making his nose bleed.

Bill's eyes widened when he realized it; he was outnumbered and this body was smaller to begin with. The kid was meant as a temporary vessel, and he couldn't find his original body if he couldn't get away from these two, and with him being occupied with the girl, Pine Tree was free to...

"Turn him over." Dipper called, and Mabel turned him on his stomach, keeping him pinned. Dipper brought his hands behind his back and tied them up. Bill growled and tried to bite Pine Tree's good arm as he struggled. This body was becoming shuggish.

"Remember that little thing about humans needing sleep?" Mabel taunted. Bill cursed the many limitations of the human body, especially younger ones. How had this happened again? How could he have forgotten?

"Okay, we need to get him to the circle." Dipper said urgently, picking the kid up by his underarms. He hissed as he forced his bloody arm to work, and it felt like it was burning. Mabel picked up his legs. "If he passes out, Bill will be expelled from Stan's body and he'll escape."

Dipper and Mabel came outside with a half-conscious Stan in their arms. Seeing the boys, everyone's faces grew alarmed.

"Dipper!" Kristen yelled, looking shocked.

"Stan!" Chris yelled, and Joe had to hold her back when she tried to run to him on instinct, reminding her that that wasn't her Stan at the moment.

"Don't worry about me." Dipper said. Nevertheless, Wendy abandoned her place and ran up to them, taking Stan's form from Dipper and Mabel.

"I've got this, guys, you two just take your places." she told them. Dipper nodded numbly, and Mabel helped him make the rest of the trip. Even with Mabel's help, though, Wendy was still back in place before them, and the half-conscious Stan was in the center of the circle.

Everyone else was already in their positions, their hands already together. "Everyone ready?" Dipper asked, as he took his place between Wendy and Soos and Mabel immediately took Pacifica's hand and Gideon's a bit more reluctantly.

Joe, Kristen, Chloe and Chris looked on in awe, and worry in Chris's case, as the ten became bathed in a blue light and lifted a short way above the ground. They could each feel an amazing surge of energy, as if by a unique magic none of them would ever experience again.

In the center, Bill struggled to keep his eyes open, refusing this defeat. He somehow managed to undo his binds and struggled to his feet. He locked eyes with Dipper, those older Pines twins now forgotten. He should have done away with that little gnat when he had the chance. He staggered over to Pine Tree and weakly grabbed onto his shirt; his grip over this body was slipping. He tried to pull the boy away, to break the circle, but the kid didn't budge.

Dipper had to resist the urge to swat Bill away, and they maintained their eye contact even as he felt himself getting dizzy from the blood loss. Bill Cipher. The demon that had made pray of his friends and family, and probably countless others. Whether he'd been told so and forgotten or it was some kind of instinctual knowledge, Dipper somehow knew this was the end – the real end – for Bill Cipher.

Bill was no longer the sly chess-master Ford, Dipper and Mabel knew, nor was he the groveling mess Stan remembered. His face was twisted in anger and his eyes were wide with a feral rage.

"PIIII –" Bill screamed. The scream faded as Bill left Stan's body, leaving the boy to drop like a stone. Above him flouted Bill, who split into ten and charged at every member of the circle. Some, like Gideon and Pacifica, flinched while others like Wendy and Dipper stared him down bravely.

Suddenly, he stopped short and began contorting in ways that somehow resembled digital glitching. The contortions climaxed in Bill bursting into a golden dust, which in turn disintegrated into the air. The incredible feeling ebbed, the ten members of the zodiac floating back down the the ground and the blue light fading as their hands dropped. Bill Cipher was no more.

The next hour or so was a blur to the exhausted Dipper and Mabel. Something about that zodiac had zapped quite a bit of personal energy, leaving the younger participants feeling sluggish. While Kristen insisted on taking Dipper to the hospital, Joe and Mabel were left to return home. As soon as they entered the door, Mabel had gone straight up to her room and was soundly asleep within a few minutes.

* * *

Woo-wee, this was a big one. I really wanted to live up to the show here. How'd I do? I think the next one's gonna be a bit of a breather. Review.

Gtv ortsg lu tivvm

szh tlmv fmhvvm

Dsem xlmhfnvw drgs low kzrm

blfi vnlgrlmh droo wizrm

 **Hint** : Switch A and Z


	17. Aftermath

**Chapter Fifteen: The Aftermath**

As he and his mother entered the house, Dipper's first thought was checking on Mabel, than maybe sleeping until dinner. He immediately went upstairs, hardly noticing when his father called Kristen into another room to talk privately.

Mabel was sleeping soundly in her bed, which was good as far as Dipper was concerned. Bill had left her with little sleep before, and she needed a good rest.

"Hey." Dipper turned around and saw Chris in the doorway, propping up her half-asleep brother who appeared to have been fixed up like he had. Seeing Dipper looking at Stan, Chris explained as she quickly fashioned a makeshift bed out of cushions and plushies and layed him down on it, covering him with an extra blanket. "Uh, Ford fixed him up. He's got, like, a whole doctor's office in his basement. We tried to get a ride with you and your mom before, but by the time I got him you were already gone."

"We didn't hurt him too badly, did we?" Dipper asked, looking at the kid's heavily bandaged and splinted hand in particular.

"Nothing that'll last." Chris said as Stan rested on her lap. She had her hand on his arm. "I think Ford said the worst was a couple of broken bones in his hand. He'll be okay." Dipper watched as she gave the kid a somber look. He imagined that she didn't like seeing her brother like that and he remembered how she'd been at the zodiac for the brief moments he payed attention to her.

"You were really worried about him, huh?" he asked.

Chris sighed, but smiled softly. "Well, you know how it is with brothers and sisters. When they need you, you do whatever it takes to come through for them."

Dipper pondered this before looking at Mabel, who was still sleeping. He smiled. "I know."

Chris looked at Dipper's bandaged arm. Dipper noticed this, and said before she can speak; "Oh, I'll be okay. It's just a cut on my arm."

"The scar." she whispered to herself. She looked almost like she was having an epiphany.

"Huh?" Dipper asked.

"Dad has a scar on his right arm. He never told us how he got it, just that we'd know when it happened. So this –"

"This was all...supposed to happen?" Dipper asked, feeling himself getting a slight headache. "Man, time-travel's confusing."

"Speaking of which," Chris said. "Bill's gone, I guess it's time for us to go back. It's not like we have anything left to do here. Besides find Blendin, I mean. Can't really go home without him."

"Well, you'll have to wait until Mabel wakes up. She'll never forgive you if you leave before she could say goodbye." Chris smiled at this. "By the way, where's Chloe?"

"Back at the shack." Chris said, scratching behind Waddles' ears when he came up to her, pawing at her free leg. "Said she wanted to explore the shack a little more."

Over with Wendy, dropping the kids off back home had hardly been close to tiring, aside from Gideon falling asleep in the car and having the carry him to his front door. His dad came out to get him, to her relief, and Pacifica had seen herself to her door where her dad was looking furious – so not much new.

Still something about that circle had taken up some of her energy, and now she just felt like sleeping. Thankfully, no one seemed to be home or she didn't hear or see anyone, and was allowed to go straight up to bed without interruption.

Robbie was lying on his bed, recounting everything to his and Wendy's group in his usual way. Tambry was sitting on a free spot on the bed, holding his head to her side and petting his hair. Whether she was genuinely comforting him or just humoring her boyfriend's tall tales, they did share an adoring gaze.

While Thomson, eager to please as ever, lapped the story up, Nate rolled his eyes at Robbie. Maybe Wendy would give them an account of what really happened.

"Ya get a hold of Wendy yet?" he asked Lee, who didn't answer; he was looking more and more worried as he tried for the fifth time to get his girlfriend to pick up.

"You shouldn't yell at her like that."

"And you shouldn't protect her all the time, you're mollycoddling her!"

Pacifica was laying in her bed, staring at the ceiling. Her parents were fighting again. It wasn't really an every day thing, but it was more frequent some times than others. Like just after they lost the mansion, after social services warned that they were being watched, and obviously, now. After everything, she had had to tell her dad what happened, and he'd blown up at her. Of coarse, she didn't really make things better by just running away with Dipper like that.

Dipper. His kids from the future. Mabel's crack about her possibly being their mother came back to the forefront her mind. Her and Dipper? She wanted to think it was crazy, that it would never happen. That it was practically against nature. But something was stopping her, although she wasn't sure what. Dipper was sweet, smart and – she blushed as she admitted it – pretty cute. Granted, Dipper had always been cute, she'd thought so even before she and Mabel had come to their senses and stopped fighting, but now that they were older...She had thought these feelings had ended over a year ago, but what Mabel said back there...Marrying him? Having his children?

"Damn Mabel." Pacifica frowned, her eyes still on her ceiling. She yawned, feeling drowsy. As she climbed beneath her covers and embraced her pillow to herself, she tried to keep her mind off of that boy. That weird, dorky, beautiful boy...

"Gentlemen, success." Ford smirked and raised his glass of apple juice, which was met with three others with a loud clink. It had been years since any of the older men had had apple juice, but Soos had a no-alcohol rule for both the shack and his house, so apple juice it was. The last anyone had seen of Chloe, she'd gone upstairs to explore the shack.

"So, is Bill, like...gone now?" Soos asked, trying to hide his nervousness – he really didn't want to do this again two years from now.

"Hopefully." Ford said. "I was never able to figure out if the zodiac actually destroyed him or if it just banished him from our realm, but at least it worked for now." There was a knock at the door, getting everyone's attention.

"You expecting anyone, Soos?" Stan asked.

"No, today was an off day." Soos said as Ford stood up and went to answer the door.

At the door, Ford was met with an odd-looking man in a gray jumpsuit and very thick goggles. Before anything could be said between them, there was an excited cry of "Blendin!" and Chloe came rushing down the stairs and hugged him.

The next day, when Mabel had finally woken up, it was time for Chris, Stan and Chloe to go. Even if none of them really knew the three all that well, Dipper, Mabel, their folks, McGucket, and Pacifica had come to see them off.

Mabel and Chloe hugged one another tightly, acting like they were saying goodbye forever to their best friends. Dipper was mindful of Stan's lingering injuries and Chris – wearing her shades again – took the initiative to hug Dipper goodbye. This whole time, Pacifica was quiet, silently glancing from Dipper to his kids in deep thought.

The group watched as Blendin inputted some kind of code on his wrist communicator, with Chris's hand on his shoulder, her other hand on Stan's shoulder, and Chloe holding Stan's uninjured hand. In a flash of light, they were gone. At least some semblance of normalcy had returned.

* * *

Sorry for taking so long on so little and how rushed the ending was, but I missed the dabtline and it's one in the morning. I've been working on something for this and I also figured out the rest of the arcs for this story, including the ending. There will be three more arcs, and things will eventually start getting dark, really earning that T rating, but not quite going M. This was just a bit of a break and as far as story goes. Next up is something that I've been wanting to do from the beginning. Hint – something about it is in the code. Review.

Ho elpmis gniht erehw evah uoy enog?

M'i gnitteg dlo dna I deen gnihtemos ot yler no.

Si siht eht ecalp ew desd ot evol?

Si siht eht ecalp taht ev'i neeb gnimaerd fo?

 **Hint** : Backwards


	18. Dipper The Hare

**Chapter Sixteen: Dipper The Hare**

It was raining hard outside. That being coupled with the cold late-autumn air and the occasional puddle of leftover slush made the whether outside absolutely miserable. As Joe and Kristen worked tirelessly in the kitchen for tonight, they could at least count their blessings that today's fowl whether meant that Dipper and Mabel wouldn't be going anywhere.

They were still reeling about that whole ordeal from a few days ago. Seeing as how the only sign anything had ever happened was Dipper's still bandaged arm and how they surprised their parents with how they'd handled themselves, Joe and Kristen had made the choice to stay here. Seeing as there had been no point in upsetting the kids over nothing, the decision had been kept strictly between them and the kids remained unaware that their parents ever considered leaving. Mabel was back to her bubbly self and, as said before, the only thing about Dipper that was left from Bill was his gash – which was healing nicely. In a smaller matter, it was lucky they'd chosen to stay because Joe had found a distraction at a store to keep the kids out of the kitchen this year; he had just barely beaten the storm home with it.

"Is it hooked up yet?" Mabel asked excitedly, already sitting laxly in her beanbag chair in front of the television and holding a video game controller that had been long discontinued.

"Yep." Dipper declared proudly as he finally finished up the wire work and the screen came on. Their old Genesis console was well over a decade old, and it had been a bit of a trick to wire it up to a modern television, but Dipper had managed it. The Genesis certainly looked primitive, too; a small black box with a couple of buttons, a pair of well-worn controllers attached to it, and a much beloved cartage sticking out of it; Blur the Hare Three.

Dipper settled down in his own beanbag chair beside Mabel and took his own controller. When he pressed Start, the all-too familiar ring of 'Genesis' filled the room for a second as the game began with a series of save-slots; all new. The options were one player as either Blur or Silver, or two-player as both. As they always had as children, Dipper selected two-player.

Immediately the twins were sucked in by the nostalgic feeling; this had been one of their favorite games to play as small children. The sixteen-bit world, the distinctive and iconic music, the familiar 'woots' and sharp, razor-like sounds. Dipper lead the way as Blur, a speedy crimson hare, and Mabel flew him out of trouble expertly as Silver, a young silver-winged falcon. Blur and Silver zoomed through the familiar terrain of the first level, after the misguided Sprint and evil Professor Gear.

As is common for older games, the first level was beaten in under five minutes. What was strange, though, was that instead of taking the kids to level two when it should have, the game brought them back to the start menu.

"What the?" Dipper asked. They saw their progress on the first save-file, but the second slot was wasn't blank as it should have been. Where it should have said 'New Game' was instead a patten of 'XAYXAY', with two-player mode already selected.

Dipper and Mabel looked at each other. Dipper smirked, having a pretty good idea of what was going to happen.

"Shall we?" he asked. Mabel nodded excitedly. He turned back to the screen, bringing up the odd file and pressing in the sequence. X-A-Y-X-A-Y. At that moment, the screen lite up, and there was a bright flash that overtook the twins, and the world went black.

Dipper got up as his vision cleared and focused on the silver-winged falcon before him, who was flopping her wings and hopping around before she looked back at him. "Silver?"

"Mabel," she answered, "Blur?"

"Dipper." he confirmed with a smirk.

"Bur and Silver." and unfamiliar voice said, and the pair looked foreword on the platform to see a blue water rat. It was Sprint, who glared at him. "Professor Gear told me everything. Trying to steal the Harmony Gems for yourselves! Well, I'm their guardian and I won't allow it!"

"Sprint, you know us!" Dipper tried to say, though he knew it was useless; it was part of the story. "Professor Gear's a lair!" Sprint tackled him and he fell to the ground. The seven brightly colored gems appeared on the ground and Sprint seemed to gather them up just by running over them. He ran off without another word.

"Well, let's go get the gems back." Mabel said and she began flapping her silver wings and found flying surprisingly easy.

"Right." Dipper said and began running through the jungle that was this level. After a short while, trees appeared with what looked like mechanical animals. Without missing a beat, Dipper and Mabel attacked all of them, freeing the small birds and rabbits that were trapped inside and collected all the golden coins that were around.

It didn't take long to find the cave with the giant coin in it. Dipper leaped up and propelled himself in midair – a useful technique for seasoned players – and the coin disappeared as he made contact with it. A green stone was left in it's place, floating higher than Dipper could jump.

"I got it." Mabel said, and flew up to where it was. The thing disappeared when she touched it with her beak and words appeared before them.

YOU AQUIRED THE GREEN HARMONY GEM! COLLECT ALL SEVEN FOR SOMETHING AMAZING TO HAPPEN.

"One down, six to go." Dipper said as Mabel landed beside him. "Now lets go get Professor Gear."

"Right." Mabel said. The pair hopped out of the cave and became a blur as they ran to the end of the level, collecting coins and jumping on foes along the way.

Professor Gear was, as always, safely in his levitating vehicle. The battle was fairly straightforward and Professor Gear was down in a pitiful five hits.

"That was easy." Mabel said.

"First level." Dipper said. Mabel shrugged and they watched as words appeared in front of them. This had never happened before – maybe it was because of this...particular bland of gameplay – but this wasn't a normal part of the game.

'SAVE AND QUITE'

'SAVE AND CONTINUE'

'DON'T SAVE'

"Whadda ya say? Next level?" Dipper asked and Mabel shook her head firmly.

"No way, that difficulty spike is totally unfair." she said. "I'm ready to go home."

Dipper saw her point. Level two wasn't really bad, but it was quite a jump from level one, and in some respects was even harder than the rest of the game. While Dipper never really minded it, Mabel detested it and often left Dipper to his own devices on that level. Maybe another day than. Maybe dinner was ready. "Okay." he said and jumped up and foreword to press the top option. A light shown from the button and engulfed them.

The kids found themselves back in their living room, in front of the television with the game's menu before them. Their first slot was as they'd left it, but the second slot now showed the same progress, with the inscription below it. Their parents and Grunkles voices could be heard from another room; they must have showed up while the kids were gone. There were delicious smells coming from the kitchen and their stomachs growled. Dipper and Mabel didn't speak, but they grinned at each other. There would be a lot more fun to be had with this game.

* * *

Seeegaaaaaa! Kinda short here, but I've wanted to do this since the beginning. When we were little, me and my brother used to play Sonic games together all the time, especially Sonic 3. We played Sonic 3 so much, our mom had to replace the cartage twice because we kept wearing the game out! Review.

Plkfa, ed axk obxiiv jleb

Plkfa, edp dlq xk xqqfqre

Plkfa, edp tdb cxpqbpq qefkd xifsb

 **Hint** : Three Letters Back


	19. The Ripple Effect

**Chapter Seventeen: The Ripple Effect**

It was only Thanksgiving night, but to Blendin it had been about a year since he'd last come to this time. And it figured that he had arrived not only in the Pines home, but just outside the small section of wall separating the twins rooms. His goggles shown a neon green as the night vision setting automatically kicked in in response to the dark surroundings.

Before he had even moved, Blendin panicked as he heard moaning and stirring coming from Dipper's room, and when those were followed by approaching footsteps, he began fiddling with the camouflage mechanism on his suit and thankfully disappeared into his surroundings seconds before Dipper opened his door.

Dipper, still clearly half asleep, passed by him obliviously, looking quite aggravated and holding a bunched up sheet, on which was what looked like a wet spot, in his hands. He groggily shuffled downstairs. Blendin was still and silent for a while; until Dipper was back asleep he couldn't risk wondering around, camouflage or not. And he had been given explicate instructions not to get the Pines kids involved in this particular case, as who knows what paradoxes it could create, even if the divergence had been years ago from this point in both lines. Perhaps to pass time, Blendin looked over the data on the current case.

Subject; Unauthorized traveler, armed and dangerous. Officer; Blendin Blandin. Year; 2014. Date; Friday, November 28. Time of Arrival; 1:58 AM.

Dipper arrived back upstairs, now free of the sheet he'd taken downstairs and went into the bathroom, where he spent a good minute, it sounded, giving his hands a thorough scrubbing. When he emerged from the bathroom, he made on last stop to the closet opposite of his and his sister's rooms, where he fished out a new sheet.

"These dreams'll be the death of me." Dipper muttered as he ran his hand through he still sweaty hair and returned to his room. After a few more shuffling noises, all was quiet. Blenden was able to sneak out of the house without much trouble after that, but as he left, it occurred to him; where was he going to sleep during this possibly extended stay?

"So what's this here thingamajiger do again?" McGucket asked, scratching his head as he looked over the huge machine with a television screen on it. He, Stan and Ford were in the Mystery shack's basement, which Soos had been good enough to give them a spare key to and where Ford had disappeared to around midnight last night.

"This ain't another inter-dimensional portal, is it?" Stan asked as he and Ford moved a particularly heavy piece of equipment to where it needed to go; just in front of the thing, but also off to the side a bit.

"Well, yes and no." Ford said, straining a bit as they set the thing down. As Stan tried to sooth his aching back with stretching, Ford began plugging wires into the outlets in the thing. "It's more like a timeline portal. You see, Hugh Everett the third proposed a theory that –"

Stan, who could sense another one of his brother's know-it-all rants, groaned impatiently. "Point, please!"

Without missing a beat, Ford complied. "Long story short, our time line is only one of millions, perhaps billions. According to this theory, every possible scenario exists in it's own time-line. So in our time-line, Stan wrecked my chances of getting into a half-way decent collage." Stan rolled his eyes at this, but chose not to pursue. "In another, the presentation went entirely as planned. Who knows where we are at this point in that line?"

"Defiantly not here, that's for sure." Stan muttered.

"Exactly, and now we're able to see what would have been." Ford said, walking over to a keyboard just beside the larger screen which had a smaller screen just above it. The words 'What If' were already on the smaller screen and he began typing something in. The words appeared beside the 'what if', reading 'Stanley Pines did not ruin his brothers chances at an elite collage.'

Stan glimpse this over his brother's shoulder and again rolled his eyes. Ford pushed the 'enter' button and the larger screen started up. As the picture cleared, McGucket and the Pines brothers thought that this couldn't be right, because it was simply the three of them as they were, fiddling around in the lab as they were at the moment.

"Ya get a camera mixed up with this thing?" Stan asked.

"I don't think so." Ford said. "I suppose it is possible that, regardless of my collage years, we all would have ended up here. But I met McGucket in the collage that I ended up in, so that can't be right. Lemme just...rewind for a bit." he said, pressing and holding one of several buttons near the larger one. The image on the screen began rapidly playing backwards like it were on an old video tape, revealing only snippets of the intervening years in brief flashes, before finally arriving at the night in question.

The experiment was in the classroom under it's tarp as Ford had left it decades before. When a younger Stan arrived on the screen and smacked the thing, Ford frowned incredulously and Stan looked sheepish. That Stan had seemingly fixed his mistake with a screwdriver in a matter of seconds, and more importantly that the device was still going, made Ford's scowl disappear, replaced by a look of surprise.

"It...wasn't your fault?" Ford asked, seeming to be genuinely confused at the idea.

"I was gonna tell ya I fixed the thing, but dad showed up and started yellin' before I could. I was just a kid, I got scared." Stan said.

Now it was Ford's turn to give his brother a sheepish look. As they grew older and Ford's intelligence became increasingly apparent, their father had started favoring him more and more. In turn, he had began treating Stan with contempt so that by the time that particular incident had happened, it had simply become the go-to solution to blame Stan the screw-up.

"Well, I...guess I owe you an apology." Ford said. "Stan, I'm sorry for blaming you for breaking my perpetual motion machine and for letting Dad toss you out like that."

"S'alright." Stan shrugged, and gave a bitter chuckle. "If ya ask me, I think he was glad to be rid of me; your motion thing was just the excuse he needed to throw me out without looking like too much of an ass. Ya know the guy didn't even come to my funeral? Mom and Shermy did, even a few pals from school. All Dad said was 'that screw-up had it comin'."

"Did I miss somethin'?" McGucket asked, raising an eyebrow at the word funeral.

"We'll explain later." Stan promised, just catching a movement on the screen. "What's that?"

Ford and McGucket turned toward the screen to see that, although the younger Stan had left, the room was not vacant. Prowling around the room was that time-traveler who took Chris those other kids back to the future. McGucket, Stan and Ford's hearts spiked with fear when he turned to face the screen, and rather than his goggles, they beheld a pair of glowing, yellow, cat-like eyes. They watched in silence as he undid Stan's fix and tinkered around the vent with a screwdriver. A few sparks went off and the orbs dropped like stones, the vent now smoking. He gave a low chuckle, quite different from the high laugh he had often given, and replaced the tarp over the machine. Finally, he snatched Stan's snack bag from the trash, planting it where Ford had stepped on it. He replaced the goggles on his face, concealing his eyes, and was gone the next moment.

Ford absently turned the thing off, and all was quiet as the three continued to stare at the now black screen. It was Stan who finally broke the silence. "Well obviously."

"He was duping us before we knew him." Ford spoke slowly.

"Well, at least we got the last laugh." Stan said.

* * *

I'm ba-ack! I'm also impatient, so I think I might actually have the next two arcs overlap a little. Lastly, thanks to some fierce writer's black that just won't leave, this one'll be kind of short for the time being. Hope no one minds. Also, smart people stuff, yay! Review.

9-14 12-9-7-8-20 15-6 21-14-4-5-18-5-19-20-9-13-1-20-9-14-7 5-9-16-16-5-18 1-14-4 13-1-2-5-12 2-9-12-12 20-15-15-11 5-24-20-18-1 16-18-5-3-1-21-20-9-15-14-18 20-15 3-1 85-1-20-5 1 4-9-6-6-5-19-5-14-4 11-9-14-4 15-6 18-9-6-20

 **Hint** : Match letters to numbers


	20. Watched

**Chapter Eighteen: Watched**

"So how long is he grounded for?" Pacifica asked. She and Mabel were walking home from school, noticeably without Dipper.

"Dunno." Mabel shrugged. "You were there, right? What happened?"

"Marty was being an creep and bugging me after lunch. Dipper decided to take things into his own hands and punch him, which your mom saw." Pacifica explained, looking annoyed.

"And I missed it?" Mabel asked. "Dipper never punches anyone and no one came to get me? Ugh." The girls walked on in silence for about a block, but Mabel glanced at Pacifica, noticing her mood.

"Hey, how's it feel to be fought over like that?" Mabel asked teasingly, a smile finally returning to her face. Said smile fell when the other girl didn't seem to be in better spirits. "Pacifica?"

"See ya tomorrow." she muttered and ran on ahead, giving Mabel the impression that she simply didn't want to be talked to.

"See ya." Mabel called in a small voice as she stopped in front of her house. She sighed and walked to and in the front door. "I'm home." she called and her spirit rose when Waddles immediately ran to greet her and began licking her face. "Hey, Waddles!"

"Welcome home, sweetie." her mother called from the living room.

"Where's Dipper?" Mabel asked as the phone rang.

"Up in his room." Kristen said and Mabel went upstairs and into his room as she answered it. "Hello, Pines res – oh hi, Priscilla. Well, apparently some other kid was harassing her, so my son decided to play hero instead of going to get someone else...Well I can't imagine what's got her upset...Maybe."

"So no monster quests for a week, huh?" Mabel asked as Dipper lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling.

"Nope." Dipper said and he couldn't fight the blush that came to his face. "Is, uh, Pacifica okay?"

"She seemed pretty mad, not sure why." Mabel explained, looking at her brother's bookcase and spotting the journals alongside his own. She grabbed journal number three. "Hey, do you mind if I barrow this?"

"You're going on an adventure without me?" Dipper asked, pretending to be hurt by this. This, Mabel supposed, counted as a yes.

"Thanks, bro-bro. If I don't get back before dinner, you'll know something bad's happened." Mabel called and bolted out of the room.

Less than an hour later, Mabel, Wendy and Pacifica were making their way through the snowy woods. Wendy was delighted and eager to join in Mabel's adventure, and it had taken them a bit of work to convince Pacifica to join them. Wendy had finally managed to convince her to come by telling her that it'll give her something to think about other than whatever was upsetting her. Waddles was with them, Mabel insisting that he could be a tracking pig.

"So what are we looking for?" Wendy asked.

"Kittycorns!" Mabel chirped, showing them the page with a pink fuzzball with a unicorn-like horn on it's head. Wendy took the page and began reading.

"Kittycorns. These kitten-like creatures are shy at first, but once they've got your scent they'll love you. They don't seem to pose much of a threat, but their horns can perform simple feats of magic. The males' horns are larger and sharper than the females. Adults shed their horns every spring and they regrow in summer. They've been observed to pair off monogamously every spring, likely their mating season. Their fur is fine and so soft it can become addictive; pet at your own risk. Apart from larger birds such as eagles and condors, Kittycorns have no known natural predators." Wendy looked up from the books. "Can't we look for something more exciting?"

"I've already made up my mind, and I need to be back before dinner." Mabel said. "Okay, so where are they?"

"There's nothing about that. Probably on a different page." Wendy said.

"Hm. The gnomes forest isn't far from here. Maybe they know." Mabel said.

"Gnome forest?" Pacifica questioned.

As Mabel led Wendy and Pacifica down the path that lead to the Gnome Forest, they remained blissfully unaware that not one, but two beings were watching them. The nearer was a creature of energy; a sentient sliver of green glow well hidden in the evergreens, thinking to itself that the misery between the younger girls – the sharp anger of the Northwest girl and the suppressed doubt and guilt of the Pines girl – would both be fine, prime sources of power.

The farther away was a man armed to the teeth with gear, his face covered by a mask and watching the three like a hawk. It was strange seeing these girls alive again, and even stranger that this didn't seem to be the same point he'd been in in his own time-line; they were all teenagers. Odd, he thought as he continued to watch them going toward the Gnome Forest, Mabel in particular.

There was a loud beeping that got the man's attention and he took a tracking device out of his coat; there was something near. He decided then that he would lay low for now. Maybe see what was different about this line from his own. But he wanted to be able to focus on his main objective. Until than, there were many things in this line to be purged.

"You're looking for the kittycorns?" Jeff asked.

"The boom doesn't say where they live, so I thought you guys might know." Mabel said, apparently oblivious to the scene behind her. Pacifica had gone from looking aggravated to seeming creeped out at the gnomes who were sniffing her ankles like they were dogs and leering up at her. She broke off a branch from a nearby tree and whacked a gnome in the face with it. Wendy simply punched one out of a tree, who was also leering at her.

"Oh yeah, they live in a grove not far from here. You'll know it by the giant tree at the head with a huge hollow at the base of the trunk. Take a left at the next oak tree and you'll come across it eventually." Jeff said, pointing to some point up ahead.

"Okay, thanks, Jeff." Mabel grinned and headed in that direction. "Come on, girls." Wendy and Pacifica seemed relived to here this and followed Mabel quickly.

"Have fun." Jeff called and waved as the girls disappeared. When he turned back to look over the other gnomes, he noticed one missing. "Huh, that's odd. Where's Carlos?"

Carlos, who was the one Wendy had punched, had fallen from his tree and rolled down a hill, more than a few yards from the others. A shadow fell over him, turning the snowy ground dark. Carlos looked up to see one of the most imposing humans he'd ever layed eyes on, and he gave a sunny smile. "Howdy stranger! How goes it?" he asked, and his eyes widened at the sharp sound of a blade being unsheathed. The human stared hard at him, raising his knife. Carlos chuckled nervously. "S-stranger?"

The girls had passed the oak tree a while ago, and eventually came to a large grove as Jeff had said. But there were no kittycorns or creatures of any kind out.

"Where are the kittycorns?" Mabel asked with a pout.

"What's that?" Pacifica asked, pointing at the huge tree with the hollow. There was a faint purring sound coming from the hollow, prompting the girls to creep closer. The closer they got, the more they saw that there seemed to be a mass of pink fur and eventually they saw that the whole floor of the hollow was covered with sleeping kittycorns. Some were smaller, larger, darker or paler than others, but all were shades of pink with pearly white horns on their heads. As the journal had said, some kittycorns had larger, sharper horns than others.

"They're so cute!" Mabel whispered in delight, and began petting one. Her eyes widened at how soft the fur was; softer even feathers or silk. The outer world seemed to stop as Mabel continued to pet the sleeping cat. Wendy pulled her hand away and gave her a firm look.

"Mabel, stop." she demanded, and Mabel noticed that she and Pacifica were looking like they'd been sitting there for a while. "You've been petting that thing for almost five minutes."

An aggravated groan got the girl's attention. Pacifica was typing away on Mabel's phone, looking annoyed. Suddenly remembering her promise to Dipper, Mabel panicked; if her parents stared freaking out -

"Pacifica, tell him I'm okay, and we're coming home now." Mabel said, seeing that the sun was setting now.

"Already done." Pacifica said moodily, showing the phone to Mabel and Wendy, and they saw the progression of messages.

 _Dipper: Mabel?_

 _Dipper: Mabel, it's almost dinnertime. Where are you?_

 _Mabel: Pacifica here. Mabel's fine. She's petting a kittycorn._

 _Dipper: Kittycorn?_

 _Mabel: Long story. Anyway, we're heading back now. See you at lunch tomorrow._

 _Dipper: Wait, Pacifica. You okay?_

 _Mabel: See you tomorrow._

"It's nothing." Pacifica muttered and turned away as Mabel took her phone back and she and Wendy gave Pacifica worried looks. When Pacifica saw this, she relented. "I'm not some pretty damsel waiting to be rescued. I can handle myself, especially against the likes of Marty. I always thought Dipper knew that."

"Come on, Fluffy, you know how boys are." Wendy said. "When there's a girl involved, they become idiots, even Dipper."

"Yeah." she muttered. "It's getting late. We really need to get back home."

"Yeah, it's getting too cold out here." Mabel complained and Waddles sneezed. "Waddles thinks so, too."

"Alright, let's go." Wendy said, and the three started back home. Although the man had lost their trail, the green sliver was ever persistent, and continued to track them.

* * *

Hehe. Most stories ease you into the dark stuff, I'm just throwing you in. Have fun! Review.

Tfos yttik mraw yttik, elttil llab fo ruf. Yppah yttik ypeels yttik rrup rrup rrup.

 **Hint** : Backwards


	21. Danger From The Shadows

**Chapter Nineteen: Danger From The Shadows**

Blood. That was what they saw.

Dipper and Mabel were sitting huddled up under a large oak, both stuck on this fact. Dipper, at least, had made the move to call Wendy and have her send Blubbs and Durland out here to check things out – as proud as Dipper was as a paranormal expert and detective, this...wasn't his department.

"Alright, kids, we did everything we could for now." there was no response to Blubbs's words, and the cops looked worriedly at these kids who'd clearly walked into something no fifteen-year-old ever should.

"Kids?" Durland asked, and at least that got some reaction in the form of Dipper lifting his eyes to look at them. "The gnomes said they just found him like that this morning. No one saw anything happen. There was no weapon, no fingerprints -"

"No lead, then?" Dipper asked dully.

"Well, there was somethin'." Blubbs said, presenting a piece of paper which was remarkably clean considering the bloody mess that it came from. "Whoever it was left this note." Dipper took it, and Mabel leaned over to read it along with him.

 _'She will be mine. The undesirables will be purged. Stay out of the way.'_ the note said. What appeared to be a signature was a D with a small section cut out of the bottom, forming a P inside the D.

Dipper and Mabel looked at each other, than to the cops. "Is this all?" he asked.

"All we found." Blubbs said. "Why don't you kids go on home? We'll finish up here."

Dipper got to his feet, clutching the note. He watched as Mabel stood up and they quietly started for home, not even saying their goodbyes to the cops or giving their condolences to the gnomes. Out of the corner of her eye, Mabel saw a few gnomes dragging Carlos's body into the woods. She had to look away. Durland opened his mouth, meaning to ask if the kids needed an escort home, but decided against it. If Dipper could fight off a giant bat at twelve, surely he could handle himself.

Dipper was laying on his bed, Mabel slumped in his chair. They kept quiet, wondering what would happen. After explaining everything to their mother, she had been quick to forbid them from returning to those woods until the killer was caught. Though Dipper and Mabel both knew this was perfectly reasonable, neither could help feeling cheated, somehow.

"Dipper, we need to go back." Mabel said.

"Mom said to stay out the the woods." Dipper replied firmly.

"We can't just sit by and do nothing." Mabel persisted. Dipper didn't reply right away, but he brought his arm up and looked at his scar. It was a long, thin line that fully spanned his forearm. The guy had a knife – or something that cuts. Dipper was ashamed to admit it, but he was afraid. The memory of his arm being sliced was fresh in his mind, he could practically still feel the seething pain.

Mabel looked at her brother and frowned. How could be be so callous? A gnome had been murdered, and he was worried about getting cut? She got up and headed out the door. Dipper eyed her.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"Nowhere." Mabel replied without stopping and closed to door after she entered her own room and took out her phone. Not fooled for a moment, Dipper got up and followed her.

"Mabel, you're not going out there alone." he declared, swallowing his fear.

"Just in case." Mabel said, dialing Wendy's number. Their parents knew very well about Wendy from their stories alone, surly having her with them would have their mother at least consider letting them go.

After much arguing, Kristen had relented in letting her kids go with Wendy, who herself had to swear multiple times that nothing would befall the twins while she was still breathing. Naturally, their first stop was the Mystery Shack, and luckily nothing happened on the way. After a tense, silent walk through the woods, the three of them relaxed and smiled tiredly at the scene just outside the shack.

"Go! Go! Go! Go!" Soos and Melody cheered. Out in the stretch of land between the woods and the shack was Soren, who's muscles were tightened and he seemed to being concentrating very hard. His wings were flapping frantically, kicking up wind and snow, and eventually achieving a lift of a few inches. He hovered for a few moments in the air, and landed, panting and with wings drooping.

"Soren!" Mabel gasped and ran to him.

"Mabel." he whinnied happily and hugged her with a wing when she latched onto him.

"Hey, dudes." Soos greeted as Wendy and Dipper ran up to him and Melody, feeling safe and relieved. Mabel and Soren joined them.

"Did you guys see that? I flew! I actually flew!" Soren neighed and reared in excitement.

"That was great, Soren!" Mabel praised.

"Soos, we need to get inside. Quick!" Dipper said and he and Wendy practically herded them inside.

"What?" Soos asked, almost disbelievingly. He and Melody looked at each other worriedly. Soren, who was spending the winter indoors and took up less space in the room than one would have thought, whinnied with alarm and suppressed the urge to rear up or unfurl his wings; he'd learned that doing so indoors often lead to something breaking.

"A gnome was butchered. We saw the body." Mabel said, the words sounding unreal as soon as she heard them.

"We wanted to make sure you guys knew." Wendy said.

"Well, the Shack's down for the winter." Melody said and she looked worriedly at Soos and Soren.

"And Stan and his brother are staying with us." Soos said, "I'll tell them when they get back from wherever they are."

"So this is where they're staying?" Dipper asked, but he wasn't worried. Ford had an untold number of weapons and he'd seen Stan take down a whole hoard of zombies with his bare hands – he was sure they'd be fine and would be able to protect whoever was here.

"Stan said they were considering staying at your place, but you teenagers need your space, right?" Soos asked. Dipper and Mabel looked at each other and shrugged nonchalantly. "Well, we'll be okay, but I think you should go home, Melody. I don't want anything to happen to you, dude." Soos said, turning to his girlfriend.

"Okay. I'll call you tonight." she smiled and Soos smiled back.

"She can come back with us." Wendy said. "We just came over to make should you guys were okay, we're heading back now."

"Actually, can that wait for a bit? I kinda want to give my condolences to the gnomes." Mabel asked, and Dipper wondered if she even remembered that the gnomes didn't even like them that much.

Dipper and the girls walked the familiar path to the gnomes' part of the woods. Well, familiar to Dipper and Mabel; it was unlikely Wendy or Melody ever came this way before. Dipper, Wendy and Melody decided to hang back, Mabel was really the one who wanted to do this. The three of them would rather just get home before it got dark.

"Jeff! Gnomes!" Mabel called. The gnomes popped their heads out of brush, hallow tree stumps and from behind trees. Jeff scampered up to Mabel looking up at her disappointed.

"Aw, you've gotten taller. If you keep this up, you'll never make a fair queen." Jeff pouted.

"I'm not your queen, Jeff." Mabel told him. "I just wanted to say sorry for your loss."

"Carlos?" Jeff said. "Oh, we already dragged him a safe distance away from the rest of us to keep the predators away."

"Oookay." Mabel said uncertainly. "Aren't you worried about the killer coming back?"

"Nope." Jeff beamed. "Now that we know we're in danger, we'll just keep on our toes and if anything does happen, we can always form the gnome beast again. Haha, remember that, stretch!" he called over to Dipper, who gave him an irritable look.

"So, you guys'll be okay?" Mabel asked.

"We'll be fine." Jeff said. "If not, you'll know. Moving on to more important things, are you sure you don't wanna be our gnome queen?" Before Mabel could refuse, Dipper pulled her away quick enough so that she only had time to wish them luck.

"Let's get going." Dipper said. "It's getting late and if we don't freeze to death, mom's gonna kill us."

The four of them kept going and again felt relieved to be back in town. Melody lived alone apart from a dog, but Wendy and the twins received earfuls from their respective fathers when they got home; the murder made the news. Dipper remained grounded, and Mabel now joined him for three days with a new curfew until the killer was caught. They now had to be back home before sunset.

* * *

Sorry this one's late, guys. I was writing this chapter and then about three days ago I got an idea about a more logical rout to take this particular chapter, and started from the ground up. It was a bit of a mess. Special shout out to whoever got the reference with the killer's signature. Review.

Efp kxjb fp japlk. Qextp grpq jbxk.

 **Hint** : Three letters back


	22. Diamonds, Snow and Mistletoe

**Chapter Twenty: Diamonds, Snow and Mistletoe**

Whoever Carlos's killer was, they were smart enough to lay low when attention was on them; it had been over a week and nothing even mildly entertaining had happened. Still Dipper kept the note, if only as a precaution, even if things had quieted down.

It was Christmas Eve, surely not a time to dwell on things like that. Soos, as part of having inherited the Mystery Shack, often held things like parties and festivals at the shack and in this case it was a holiday party. Dipper and Mabel were snickering as they exited the car, hearing their mother talk in a tone that neither had heard from her since they were seven or eight.

"Now what won't you do?" Kirsten asked as she and her husband exited the car.

"I won't pick a fight with or raise to Northwests bait." Joe groaned, becoming annoyed very quickly.

"Thank you." Kristen said as they walked the path through the pine woods to the shack.

There were poles set up all around the edge of the clearing, adorned with softly glowing lights of blue, green, red and yellow that lite the area up. Several people were chatting, and it was clear that many more were inside the shack, where it was warm. That certainly seemed like the better option.

"Snack table, here I come!" Mabel grinned and Dipper followed her into the fray. As Mabel wandered off, Dipper came across, of all possible pairings, Soos and Pacifica.

"Come on, you've gotten this far." Pacifica said to a nervous looking Soos.

"Well...what if she doesn't –" Soos stammered.

"She will." Pacifica said. "Look, you're psyching yourself out. Midnight's ten minutes away, go do something take your mind off of it for a while."

Soos took a deep breath, and said calmly, "Okay. I'll...go take inventory of some new merchandise."

"Calm down, guy!" Pacifica called as he walked into another room.

"What was that about?" Dipper asked, looking after Soos with her.

"Secret." she told him. "You'll find out at midnight."

"Well, can you let me in on it?" Dipper asked, giving her a mischievous look. Pacifica turned away from him, holding her arms and smiling coyly. "Come on, you can tell me." he persisted, coming up beside Pacifica and nudging her arm with his. "Please?" Her smile grew, and it was clear she wanted to tell him. Neither was aware that their exchange had gathered a small audience. Blubbs and Durland held hands tightly and looked at this seen with an almost nostalgic adoration. Wendy smirked, but her attention was soon yanked away by the sight of a tuft of leaves with small white berries hanging in a doorway. Mabel, her lips smeared with chocolate, looked like she was about to burst, and Kristen and Priscilla exchanged amused looks. As for their husbands...

If there was one thing Joseph Pines and Preston Northwest could ever genuinely agree on, it would be that they were both unsettled by the scene before them. Jason was more concerned for Dipper, but he certainly didn't like the prospect of becoming related to Preston, either. Preston, meanwhile, was eying Dipper angrily. First those kids are a bad influence on Pacifica, than they lure her into their dangerous nonsense. Now that boy was so bold as to start snooping around his daughter; to say nothing of the way she was falling for it...

"Joe." Kristen said warningly, glancing between the two men. They looked at each other with distaste and Joe sighed; he supposed he'd have to be the bigger man about this. Nothing new there.

"Look, Northwest," he started. "You and I both know we've never gotten along and that, by some miracle, you managed to turn out a decent kid." he privately savored the anger on Preston's face and felt his wife's aggravation seething the back of his head; if he wasn't careful he'd be spending the night on the couch. "You and I might hate each other, but do our kids have to?"

"He has a point, dear," Priscilla said as she and Kristen watched their kids. The semi-romantic scene from before had ended, the crowd had dispersed, and Dipper was nowhere to be seen. Pacifica was now chatting with Mabel, who must have said something interesting by the way Pacifica perked up and gave chase when Mabel ran into the kitchen, both girls keeping playful smiles on their faces with ease. "and those kids do seem to make her happy."

As Preston looked at the girls laughing and chasing each other around and up the stairs, he was loath to admit it. With the onset of the school-year following Bill's apocalypse, Pacifica had been melancholy for quite a while. She'd claimed she was feeling lonely, and although she perked up quite a bit when she began hanging out with that older girl, Preston had never seen her quite as happy as just now.

"Preston?" Priscilla asked, and he looked at her. He groaned in defeat.

"Fine. If it really makes her happy, than I guess I might as well allow it before she starts sneaking out at night."

"Thank you." Kristen groaned to the ceiling, and spied the girls coming back down, or rather, Mabel dragging a confused-looking Pacifica by the wrist toward the kitchen.

"Where are we going?" Pacifica asked, glancing at her phone hurriedly.

"You have your secrets, I have mine." Mabel grinned as they stood in front of the door. "Now we wait."

"Okay, but I really have somewhere to be in seven minutes. Make that six." Pacifica said, and she watched Soos pulling Melody out of the door, looking as though he simply wanted to get away from the party for a moment.

"What was that text abou -" Dipper said, and paused when he looked at them. From the other side of the door, Wendy had pushed him to this spot and was now holding him in place by his arms, as Mabel was doing with Pacifica. Mabel and Wendy gave knowing looks as they looked upwards to the top of the doorway. Following their gazes, Dipper and Pacifica saw it.

Mistletoe.

They stared at each other. Dipper's need to investigate Wendy's text was forgotten and Pacifica felt trapped. The time seemed insignificant and...she wanted to. She wanted to kiss Dipper, but did he want to? How did you even do this? She'd never initiated a kiss before. Judging by the way she felt Mabel pushing her closer to him, she had to think of something.

When her alarm blared, she took the opportunity to wiggle out of her friend's grasp and speed-walk outside, leaving a frustrated Wendy and a pair of confused looking Pines twins looking after her. Dipper looked concerned for a moment before he ran after her, closely followed by the girls. Not that he wasn't thankful to be out of that situation, but...was it him?

In exchange for helping him out a few months ago, Soos had agreed to let Pacifica watch it play out, telling her the time and place it would happen. The alarm had been to leave the shack and she had a good five minutes to get there. She was now walking down a barley noticeable path through the woods, the kind of place you wouldn't notice unless you were looking for it. Finally calming down, she slowed into a stroll and allowed herself to look at the scenery. The evergreens had always been beautiful in winter, especially at night when the snow looked blueish. Things were peaceful for a few seconds, before the calling of her name brought her back to reality.

"Pacifica!" Dipper called, and she stopped and allowed him and the others to catch up to her. Dipper gave her an apologetic look. "Look, uh...About what happened back there..."

"It's okay." she told him, turning and carrying on. Dipper followed, as did Mabel and Wendy.

"Pacifica –" he tried to say.

"Really, i-it's fine." Pacifica said, coming to a fallen tree and hiding behind the trunk. Before them was a meadow of snow. It was completely untouched apart from the tracks left by Soos and Melody, who stood together in the meadow, close enough to see and hear theme clearly."Just keep quite."

"What's happening?" Mabel asked, and Pacifica shushed her.

Despite the cold, Soos felt his hands sweating. He felt the tiny, precious box in his pocket, and forced himself to calm down – him having a heart attack would probably put a bit of a damper on things.

"This is so pretty." Melody smiled serenely, watching as it began snowing softly.

"Hehe, yeah." Soos mused nervously. He swallowed. "Uh...Melody?" she turned to him. "This is really hard for me. I've...been practicing." Melody giggled and Soos blushed, immediately regretting his choice of words. "N-no, not like that! I just..." he paused and swallowed again. "Since you've been working at the shack, things have been really...good. Great, even."

"That's good. I like working at the shack." Melody smiled up at him and her eyes softened. "I really like being with you."

Behind the log, Mabel and Pacifica were both grinning wildly and their eyes had taken on a starry look. Dipper, deciding for his own safety, moved out from between them and settled on the other side of Wendy, lest he end up strangled in some unholy explosion of emotion. Wendy kept her eyes intently on the pair.

"I really like being with you, too, dude." Soos smiled, gaining a bit of confidence from this. "Work's never been more fun than when you were with me. Anyway, I, uh...I realized something last summer. I realized that I..." Soos froze, but he kept his eyes trained on Melody's and found his voice once more. The words came surprisingly easy. "I love you, Melody."

If not for Wendy's hand flying over her mouth, Mabel would have probably blown their cover right there. Soos knelt as he took a small, black velvet box from his pocket and presented it to her. Now it was Melody's turn to be speechless, the pieces of the puzzle coming together in her head. Soos smiled warmly, and the development before them just made Mabel all the more difficult to retrain. She yelled something that sounded like 'oh, get on with it!', which was muffled by Wendy's hand.

"So here I am on one knee." Soos continued. "Asking you to be Mrs. Melody Ramirez." He opened the box, revealing a golden ring with a modest but beautiful diamond. Melody was in tears and Soos hardly had time to stand back up when she leaped into his arms and kissed him.

"Of course I say yes!" she squealed and the pair laughed as they held each other.

When they released each other, Soos called, "Okay, dudes, you can come out now!"

"Congratulations!" Mabel squealed as she broke free of Wendy and ran to embrace them.

"Hey, it's getting cold out." Wendy called. "I had to jump through hoops to convince my dad to let me come here, and I'm not spending it getting frostbite."

"Okay, let's get back to the shack." Soos said, his arm around Melody, who was now wearing her ring.

"Dibs on telling everyone!" Mabel called and bolted back the way they came, kicking up snow on her way.

"Hold it, Mabel!" Wendy called and chased after her. Soos and Melody looked at each other lovingly and strolled back slowly, clearly wanting to just enjoy the peace in each other's company.

Pacifica was about to join them, but she noticed the scenery of this meadow. It truly was beautiful. There were no lights all the way out here, so the sky was alive with stars, giving off enough light to light up the clearing in spite of the thin crescent that was the moon. The snow was undisturbed and looked magical as it fell, covering the field and far-off pines like a cyan powder.

She was aware when Dipper came up to stand beside her and looked at her, mesmerized. Her cheeks were reddening and her eyes looked amazing in the snowy night. Her hands were cold – in the fuss to get out here, she'd forgotten her gloves back at the shack – so she brought them up to her mouth to blow warm air into them. Dipper swallowed, part of him wondering what he was about to do, but chances were something he lived for.

In the middle of Pacifica rubbing her hands together, Dipper took them in his, covering them and rubbing them for her. At some point, maybe for easier access, they turned to face each other, neither minding the closeness. Throughout the whole thing, they held each other's gazes, only even blinking when necessary.

Even after Pacifica's hands were sufficiently warmed, Dipper kept his hands clapped over hers. In their staring, the two had drifted close enough together that they could now feel each other's warm breath on their faces. Not entirely consciously and as though guided by instinct, they closed the small gap between them

The kiss was small and chaste, but there was a sudden electricity between them. The feeling was intoxicating and he was so gentle and she smelt like flowers and they didn't want to ever stop. Things ended suddenly when they realized what was happening. The kiss broke, the wonderful feeling coming to a screeching halt, and Pacifica backed away, Dipper finally letting go of her hands. They looked away from each other.

"Sorry." Dipper muttered, simply not knowing what else to say.

"Happens." Pacifica replied shortly, though she had no idea what that even meant.

"We, uh...we should probably -" Dipper started, "get back" he and Pacifica said together. "Yeah." he said, grinning awkwardly. The rest of the night was spent trying to enjoy the party, which neither could really do, whether it was wondering what that was about or simply a sudden longing for each other's company. One thing's for sure; for the rest of that night, Dipper and Pacifica made absolutely certain to steer clear of that mistletoe.

* * *

Feel the whiplash! People, and me, have been waiting for this, so here it is before we get too far away. I know it's like, September now, but who knows where we'll be in the story by the time the holidays role around? So here it is, Christmas in summer. Happy wacky holidays, everybody.

De dna Yrniw, gnittis ni a eert

Gnihtemos ot od htiw ymehcla.

 **Hint** : Backwards


	23. Hindsight Is Twenty-twenty

**Note** : Phew, was that ever a time. I just got the physical copy of journal 3 for myself and after tearing myself away from it after an hour, realized that I had some major editing to do one this baby. All is well now, though.

 **Chapter Twenty-one: Hindsight Is Twenty-twenty**

The first day back to school had just ended, and Wendy, Mabel, and Robbie were riding up to the mansion and laughing, Dipper sitting by a window and remaining silent with a pensive look on his face.

"Come on, Wendy, one more time." Mabel said through a giggle.

"Okay, okay." Wendy said, suppressing her own laughter for this last bit. She made her eye twitch in an angry face in an obvious imitation of Mr. Poolcheck. "Piiiines! How dare you fall asleep in my class! Get up, boy!" The laughter continued.

Dipper didn't mind so much that they were making jokes about it. Mr. Poolcheck had gone completely red, which must have been a funny sight to anyone he wasn't screaming at. What was troubling him was the daydream he'd been caught in. It was about that...private moment between him and Pacifica a week ago. If he'd lost himself over it during class, what else could happen in the future? He needed to think of something.

"So, what are those old guys still doing here?" Robbie asked, snapping Dipper out of his thoughts. "I thought they were only gonna be in town for a few days."

"Ford said they were seventy now, so they're too old to keep up their trip and since we're already here they just decided to stay in town." he explained. "They're staying with McGucket for now, he has more than enough space for them and a century's worth of inventions."

That certainly explained the constant back and forth in the past week of moving vans going between the Mystery Shack and the mansion. They were moving all of the Pines's possessions, mostly Fords inventions, to the mansion so that the basement to the shack was now just that, a basement. Soos was quick to turn it into a storage area for his family; after all, it seemed as though they would be needing the extra space soon enough.

Dipper gripped his backpack excitedly, pushing his previous problem to the back of his mind. Stan and Ford had finished the last of the renovations this morning and had invited them over to see something after school. Ford said he'd perfected a new invention today and had promised that the kids would like it. They had both been anticipating this all day and Mabel had sweet-talked an unaffected, but amused, Robbie for the ride.

The four exited the car; Robbie and Wendy had opted to join them, Wendy out of curiosity and Robbie with the intention of putting off his homework. Wendy opened up the surprisingly light door and entered the mansion. The place wasn't messy or in tatters, but the shine and feel of wealth was no longer present.

"Hey there, kids!" McGucket called from the top of the stairs.

"Hi, McGucket!" Mabel called as they ran to meet him.

"So what's the invention? We've been waiting all day." Dipper asked.

"Ford says he wants to be the one to explain it." McGucket said, and he lead the kids down one of the halls to a room that Dipper only somewhat recognized. It was the room that, as a pair of endangered twelve-year-olds, Pacifica had pleaded with him to avoid entering because of the carpet. Said carpet no longer had it's sheen, in place of the fancy furniture was now a plethora of machines and tools, and the walls were already covered in blueprints and notes.

Beside one of these machines was an old computer on which Ford was typing away, his eyes intently on the screen.

"Hi, Grunkle Ford." Mabel greeted, unsure of whether or not she would even get a response. No such luck.

"Ford?" Dipper asked. Still no response. Wendy looked from this scene to one of the machines, her eyes zeroing in on a large button.

"What's this do?" she asked, though she made no attempt to press it. This seemed to have gotten to desired response as Ford flinched out of his work to look at McGucket and the four teenagers.

"Oh, you're hear." he said, looking as though he'd awoken from a deep sleep. "How was school?"

"Fine." Dipper said briefly.

"Dipper fell asleep in gym class." Mabel teased and he frowned at her.

"How you you fall asleep in gym?" Stan asked as he came into the room. "Isn't that the class you need to actually do stuff in?

"And look who's saying that." Ford said, shooting a look at his brother. Stan narrowed his eyes at him.

"Sup, Mr. Pines." Wendy greeted coolly.

"Hey, Wendy. Skinnyjeans." Stan replayed halfheartedly. Robbie didn't say anything, but it was clear the nickname confused him.

"Moving on," Dipper said insistently. "what did you guys want to show us?"

"This." Ford said proudly, gesturing to the machine near his computer, which looked nearly identical to the mind-reading machine, apart from being about the size of a modern television. There was also a small lever below a tiny screen on the keyboard that looked big enough for just a couple of words at a time.

"This is a memory retriever. Whoever wears the helmet will have an old memory played out for them on the screen. It's mostly for faded or repressed memories." Dipper and Mabel looked at each other, both wondering if he'd made such a thing in response to Stan's memory having once been wiped for the greater good. "There are settings here, so you can input the specific kind of memory you're looking for, if you chose." Ford carried on pulling the lever, as one by one, words popped up on the smaller screen. "Happy memories, sad memories, hopes, regrets, things like that. Here's a demonstration."

Ford placed the helmet on his own head and secured it. He pushed the large button and immediately the screen filled with static. "Hey, bro?" Stan said, his eyes lingering on the controls Ford had just fiddled with. Ford looked at him questioningly. "You do realize that you forgot to turn off those settings of yours, right?"

Ford's eyes widened as he looked down at the smaller screen, were the word 'regret' remained. What would show up? Allowing himself to get tricked by Bill? Shouting at McGucket that he didn't need him? Being forced to erase his own brothers mind? As the screen cleared, the one thing he knew was that this would not be fun.

It was his seventeen-year-old self, laying the top bunk of his and Stan's old bed. The door to the room was cracked open, and even more predominant then the actual picture was the shouting from downstairs.

"Fill, this is crazy!" his mothers voice could be heard downstairs. It was clear she was trying to keep calm for the sake of the baby. Shermie and his wife had sure picked a lousy night to leave the kid here for the night. Argh! Was he the only reliable brother between the three of them?

"That little screw-up has been on thin ice since he was five!" his father shouted, causing the baby to wail. Mrs. Pines could just be heard shushing the baby and trying to comfort it, which seemed to work as the crying died down quickly. Fill went on. "Thanks to that little thorn in my side, we're stuck here. Ford was the only way to get out of this rathole town and Stan had to ruin that, too! At least he's out of our hair, now. I pity whatever poor sap takes that dud in. He'll probably run them into the ground in a week."

"Fillbrick Pines, you go out there and find our son this instant!" The sudden shouting of his mother sent a shiver down Ford's spine and it sounded like she was crying. The shivers, though, were replaced with anger and Ford sat up, a frightening look on his face. He leaped down from the bed, turned to the bottom bunk and scooped up the sheets, blanket and pillow, heaving them out of the open window. He'd always hated that messy bed anyway.

"Stanford!" he could hear his mother gasp. They must have seen the pile from the window.

"There, ya see?" his father said in an approving tone. "Ford's got the right idea. At least we got one good egg." Good egg. His father called him the good egg. Eager for more praises, Ford turned his anger on the rest of the room – more specifically Stan's stuff. Soon enough, all of Stan's junk that would fit out the window from his cloths to his snack wrappers was littering the sidewalk. If Stan could disrespect his property and break his things, Ford was quite happy to return the favor. He could hear what was probably his mother coming up here to scold at him, but he didn't care; it just felt so good to be able to put that...that idiot in his place. The screen blurred and finally went completely fuzzy as Ford hurriedly removed the helmet.

"Someone...please give me a distraction." Ford said. He didn't look specifically guilty or upset, but he did seem uncomfortable to have witnessed that particular memory.

"Sure." Wendy said, taking the helmet and putting it on. "Just take it off that setting first."

"Any other specifics?" Ford asked as he pulled the lever again until the screen went blank. Dipper and Mabel exchanged intrigued looks; neither new much about Wendy's life before they met her.

"Nah. Surprise me." the girl shrugged and Ford activated the machine. The large screen became fuzzy again, and the picture cleared a bit quicker this time, as though the machine was getting used to it's job.

The scene was of a simple room that Dipper, Mabel and Robbie recognized as Wendy's kitchen. Sitting at the table was a woman who looked like an older, brown-haired version of Wendy, and a small redheaded girl who appeared to about three or four. The woman also had a swollen belly.

"Mommy, when's my sister gonna get here?" the little girl asked, eying her mother's stomach impatiently.

"Wendy, we've been through this." the woman said. "Mommy's gonna have the baby, but we can't keep it. It's not ours."

"Why not?" the child asked.

"Because this baby belongs to the Northwests." the woman explained. "Mrs. Northwest payed mommy and daddy a lot of money to carry her baby for her, but we won't be able to keep her."

"But I want my sister." little Wendy pouted. "If those rich people want a baby, why don't they have it themselves?"

"Actually, I don't really know," her mother said, and looked at her daughter tenderly as she lifted the child's chin with her fingers. 'because the days you and your brothers were born? Those were the best three days of my life." Seeing the child was still a bit downcast, the woman went on. "Tell you what. We'll give this baby to her parents now, and in a few years we'll try to get you that sister. Alright."

The little girl didn't speak at first, but she hugged her mother, who embraced her lovingly in return. "You promise?"

"I promise." she said as she stroked the little girl's hair. The picture went fuzzy and no one seemed to notice Wendy hastily wiping her tears away before she removed the helmet, though it was harder to hide the way she took deep, even breaths to keep from sobbing.

"Wait, so that blond kid's you sister?" Robbie asked. Dipper and Mabel looked surprised at this bit of news, Dipper sneering in annoyance; even back than they were foisting off their responsibilities on people who didn't deserve it.

"Not exactly." Wendy said, trying to keep her voice steady and with one final breath managed to calm down. "Mom was a surrogate 'cause Mrs. N didn't want to ruin that precious figure of hers."

"Dibs!" Mabel called, and took the helmet from Wendy and put it on her own head. The screen cleared quicker this time, revealing a pair of seven-year-olds playing on swings on a playground. Though Mabel only had a vague feeling about this, Dipper remembered this all too well, and swallowed nervously.

"Hey, Mabel!" little Dipper called over to his sister. "Bet you can't jump the fence!"

"Oh, really?" Mabel asked, smirking at him. "I bet I can!"

"Bet you can't." the little boy goaded again.

"Alright!" Mabel called and they stopped abruptly, looking challengingly at each other. Dipper got off of his swing as Mabel held the chains of her swing tightly as she stood up on the seat. Dipper began pushing her, watching her go higher and higher, certain she couldn't pull this off. When she got high enough, Mable leaped off of the swing and flew towards the fence, the voices of their parents calling her name in alarm and the other kids watching and cheering. Mabel managed to glaze the fence, but came down on the concrete in front of it.

The rest of the picture was blurry. Young Dipper stood there frozen as their parents screamed and got to her. Kristen hugged Mabel's unconscious body and Joe fixed Dipper with a furious stare before saying that they needed to get to a hospital and were leaving. Dipper saw blood coming from his sisters head. Finally, the picture melted into fuzz.

"Huh." Mabel said, not nearly as affected as her brother, who was shaking. Wendy, Stan and Ford gave the boy concerned looks, which he didn't seem to notice. "I don't remember any of that."

"I do." Dipper said quietly. "The doctors said you hit your head really hard. Like, _really_ hard." This stunt had earned Dipper the longest grounding of his life, even to date, Mabel was in the hospital for over two weeks and came back with a broken arm, and it had given Dipper two realizations. The first was that that sort of thing was dangerous, maybe it would be less trouble to stay inside and play video games from now on. The second, he remembered as he gripped the sleeves of his jacket, was that nothing would ever, ever happen to his sister again.

* * *

Another character-based chapter, I'll get back to the supernatural stuff next chapter. Review.

Quokfkd x yifka bvb ql molyijp xitxvp exp zlkpbnrbkzbp clo pljblkb.

 **Hint** : Three Letters Back


	24. Emo Kit

**Chapter Twenty-two: Emo Kit**

Dipper walked irritably down the path cutting through the woods, this being one of the few times he'd come out here without his journal or even his backpack. This wasn't an adventure, he just needed to take a walk to cool down. That damned Mabel always ruined everything! Their argument had ended with her running out of the house, and good riddance as far as he was concerned.

"Wonder if she's gonna start another apocalypses." he muttered to himself bitterly. She'd told him about her involvement in Weirdmaggedon on their bus ride home when they were thirteen, and he'd been too forgiving. All she ever did was screw up, and why did he put up with it?

He was startled by a loud screech and took a step back when he realized that he'd stepped on something. The snow fell from a nearby shrub as it rattled, the creature having dove into it, clearly afraid. Dipper looked closely at the shrub and saw what looked like a small fox through the branches, but it was dark reddish with tends of purple. It's eyes were huge and fearful as it trembled.

Dipper crouched down and outstretched his hand, but the creature took on a defensive stance and growled fiercely at him. Taking the hint, Dipper drew his hand back in a mixture of confusion and a creeping fear of being attacked. He sighed and stood up, muttering an apology to the thing as went on his way. After a while, Dipper got the feeling he was being followed, and turned around to see the fox, it's fur now a common orange color, and it might have been his imagination, but Dipper could have sworn that it was a bit bigger, as well.

"Hey you." He called and crouched down as the fox trotted up to him. Dipper, again, outstretched his hand and this time, the fox met him half-way and pressed it's head into his palm. Granted, Dipper was wearing gloves and couldn't feel his fur, but he supposed this was good enough. When he pulled his hand away and stood back up, the fox kept following him. When he found nothing he hadn't before, he looked to his little companion, who's fur seemed to be going brown and it also seemed to be getting a little bit smaller.

This peeked Dipper's interest. He picked the fox up and retraced their trail. The fox's tracks were growing and shrinking in the snow, and he looked at the thing. "You're a shape-shifter?" he asked, and the fox yapped in response. Taking that as a 'yes', Dipper started back the way he came. "Come on, I think my uncles would like to meet you."

The inside of the kitchen was toasty. Dipper, Kristen, Stan and Ford sat around the table, Dipper filling them in about the odd little fox who was scarfing down the bowl of table-scraps, clearing enjoying his easy meal in the warm house.

"So you just found him alone?" Ford asked.

"Well, I didn't see anything else, and he followed me around for a while." Dipper explained. "I'm pretty sure he's some kind of shape shifter, I've seen his fur change."

"Well, this is a strange form, than." Ford said as the fox's head shot up and he leaped off of the table as Waddles, screeching, jumped up onto the table and began chasing the it around. A mixture of defensive hisses and angry squeals filled the other rooms.

"Maybe we shouldn't have fed him from Waddles' bowl." Kristen said and she took the bowl off of the table and set it back in it's spot on the floor. As they heard the front door open, two things became apparent. The first was that the fox ran out the door with Waddles following him and the second was that, by the yelps that were no doubt caused by them, along with Joe, Pacifica had stopped by for a visit.

"What the!?" Joe sounded shocked. Waddles had a leash, which he wasn't allowed outside without.

"Got 'im!" Pacifica's voice came, and Waddles' intensified squealing said that she'd caught him.

"We're in the kitchen!" Stan called.

"Uncle Stan!" Joe exclaimed as he entered the kitchen, followed by Pacifica who was eager to set down the pig, who bolted into another room and up the stairs the moment his hooves touched the ground. "Is anything going on?"

"Dipper found a shape-shifter in the woods. That's what the pig was chasing away." Ford explained and Joe raised an eyebrow in surprise. "It's okay, it seemed benign." There was a sudden purring noise and Pacifica looked down to her feet, prompting the others to do the same. The fox was back, it's fur now a soft pink and rubbing itself against her legs affectingly.

"There he is." Dipper gave a dry grin and Pacifica bent down and picked the fox up. It's purring grew and it continued to rub it's head against her.

"Seems pretty fond of ya, kid." Stan told her.

"Hm, I see what you mean." Ford said to Dipper, referring to the fox's shifting.

"Mabel's gonna love this." Dipper mused.

"Oh right," Pacifica said and placed the fox back on the table. "has anyone seen Mabel? She said she'd be coming over for a little, but she never showed up."

"She's probably off sulking somewhere." Kristen said.

Feeling a twinge of guilt, Dipper looked down at the fox as it changed colors. It morphed into a pale, almost white color and shrank a bit, bunching itself up fearfully. Ford observed this closely and his eyes went from his nephew to the fox in surprise. Well, this was unexpected.

"Dipper, how about you take it up to your room for some more personal observations. Maybe you'll find out what triggers the shifts." Ford suggested.

"Good idea, Grunkle Ford." Dipper said, picking the fox up to carrying it out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Not being sure of what else to do, Pacifica followed, leaving the adults alone.

"So, what did you mean when you said Mabel was off somewhere sulking?" Ford asked Kristen.

"Oh, the kids had a fight." she said, pinching the bridge of he nose. "Mabel ran out of the house and after a moment, Dipper came down and said he needed to go for a walk. I can't even remember what the fight was about."

"Okay, just stay still." Dipper said as he sketched the fox, who was laying on Pacifica's lap contently as she petted him. As Dipper finished the sketch and jotted down all he he observed about this creature, he and Pacifica sat in complete silence.

"Don't you think it's weird we havn't talked about it?" she asked.

"Talked about what?" Dipper asked, getting an idea of what she was talking about but hoping otherwise. It occurred to him that this was the first time they'd been alone since Christmas Eve.

"That thing. Where our lips touched." she said, and Dipper shushed her. The fox jerked awake and grew such a bright red he was almost luminescent.

"What's with him?" Dipper asked, and Pacifica sent him a reproachful look; as though he were brushing her off. "It's like he's..." He didn't finish his sentence, he just went right back to scribbling in the journal.

"What's going on?" Pacifica asked as the fox jumped out of her lap, turning orange and than yellow, and walked over to see what Dipper was doing.

"I was mad when I met him, maybe a little scared, and he was this dark red color. He freaks out whenever I do and..." He stopped and glanced up at Pacifica. Their eyes met for a moment, his cheeks turning red before he looked back at the journal and pushed himself on. "E-emotions. He can read emotions and transforms accordingly!" Dipper said, and the fox yipped, sitting very tall and proud.

"So, what are you going to call it?" Pacifica asked.

"The Emo kit." Dipper announced. She seemed unimpressed. "You know, like emo kid, but it's a kit because...a fox."

"You're such a dork." Pacifica smirked, seeing the fox, his fur now a pale color, hide under the bed once more. "So, should he go back to the woods?"

"I guess he should." Dipper said, scratching the fox between the ears.

"Great, let's go." she said, standing up and putting her coat back on – Dipper did the same, and his eyes widened as she grabbed his hand and gently pulled him along. The fox was in Dipper's free arm, his fur alternating between red and pink and he tried to hide his face in Dipper's shoulder.

The pair went unnoticed out of the house, which Dipper appreciated. Part of him wanted to end the awkwardness and take his hand back, but another part couldn't think of it. Her hand was so soft, so warm. Warmth and hands brought back the memory of the kiss, and Dipper could feel his heart pick up and the fox going crazy in his arm. Pacifica had to calm herself down, too, and she had suddenly felt a need to be close to him. It didn't matter to her who saw them or what they thought. They walked through the town and into the woods.

"O-okay, this is where I found him." Dipper said, awkwardly jerking his hand away and setting the fox down.

"Sorry, little guy, but you need to go home." Pacifica urged, but the fox just swiped at her hand playfully. Dipper watched her. He had seen the thousands of animal trophies her family had and remembered the picture of a Northwest standing on a mound of animal carcasses, and he knew that it must have been a bit of a sore spot for her.

Dipper took the fox from it's spot and set it facing away from them, nudging it to go into the woods. It looked back at them questioningly. Dipper and Pacifica looked at each other and decided to just head back. The hadn't gotten a few feet when Dipper looked behind them to see the fox following him.

"I don't think he wants to go home." Dipper said.

"Well, if he had a family..." Pacifica trailed off. There was no other creature here, and the now small, blue fox walked up to Dipper and pawed at his foot pleadingly.

Feeling a pang of empathy, Dipper picked the fox back up. "Well, we can't leave him out here to freeze or get shot. He's...just a baby, right?" Pacifica smiled at this and the fox turned a warm pink when she petted him. "And I guess he is following me home, so at least we've got that old cliche on our side."

Pacifica laughed. "What're you going to name him? And don't you dare say 'emo kit' again."

"Or you'll what?" Dipper teased, and Pacifica gave him a playful shove. They laughed as the fox snuggled into Dipper's warmth. "This little guy caused a bit of chaos today, so how about...Loki?"

"How're you gonna get your mom to let you keep it?" she asked.

"Don't know. Maybe try the same line Mabel used to introduce Waddles to her and Dad." Dipper mused.

"And what was that?"

"Mom, you remember how you always said we could have another cat?" Dipper resided, and he and Pacifica laughed as they started for home. "Aw, man, she's gonna love this." Loki made his purr-like noise again, his fur glowing a happy golden color as he snuggled into his new owners' arms.

Dipper woke with a start, his head reeling. The sun was just rising, and he remembered that it was Saturday. What had woken him up this early on a Saturday? The sound of his father calling his name answered his question, but than, what was so important that they needed him this early? Loki rolled over on his bed. Although the fox had only become a member of the Pines's last night, he had wasted no time establishing a spot of himself on Dipper's bed. He rubbed the fox's head as he got up from his bed.

He yawned as he came into the kitchen, but he stopped as he took in the scene before him. Joe and Kristen were sitting at the table, seeming not to notice him, looking like they hadn't slept.

"Uhhh..." Dipper droned.

"I can't imagine where she could be." Kristen said in a tired voice, and it looked as though she'd been crying. "Maybe we should call the police."

"What's going on?" Dipper asked, making his parents jump.

"It's Mabel." Joe said. "She didn't come home last night. I was out looking all night. Your mother's called the Chius, the Northwests, the Gleefuls, everyone, and no one's seen her."

* * *

And so begins arc number two...Wo-ho-ho-ho-ho! And just as a clear-up, Loki is an orphan; poor little fella's got no family. Awww. Review.

Llehs reven eb etiuq eht emas retfa siht

 **Hint** : Backwards


	25. Lost And Found

**Chapter Twenty-three: Lost And Found**

Dipper scowled as he lay on Mabel's bed, staring up the ceiling. He'd just blown up at Blubbs and Durland, stomped up here and slammed the door shut. Profile? They knew her! They knew what she looked like! Evidence? How about that no one knew where she was? They'd find her? How could they find her when they hadn't started looking yet?

"Hey, Champ." Stan's voice came. He was standing in the doorway with a sandwich in hand, and decided to approach when Dipper didn't respond. He sat down on the bed and looked at Dipper, who was laying so still he could have passed for a manikin. "Ya holdin' up?" Dipper only shook his head no. "You wanna be alone?" No again.

"We had a fight." Dipper's voice was quiet and blank. "The last things we said to each other were..." Dipper didn't finish, nor did he have to. It seemed that there was some understanding between the two, even if they weren't even looking at each other.

"It's noon." Stan said, looking down at the sandwich. "Have you eaten yet?"

"Not hungry." Dipper answered shortly. Stan frowned, took the sandwich from it's plate, and presented it to Dipper.

"Take it from someone who knows, Dipper." he said "Starving yourself isn't going to get her back."

Dipper sighed as if in annoyance, but he finally sat up, took the sandwich and started eating almost mechanically. Stan looked at him worriedly. Midway through the sandwich, he stopped. To Stan's surprise, he boy gave a small snicker. "She was the first one to call me 'Dipper'." He took a deep breath, as if to force back tears. "She said...there were three Masons in the class, but only one Dipper."

"Well, you are definitely one of a kind, kid." Stan said, and they managed to laugh for a few moments before the melancholy mood set back in.

"Stan?" Dipper asked. "When are we gonna go look for her?"

"We'll head out after you finish that sandwich. See ya downstairs." Stan said as he got up. Dipper nodded while Stan left the room. As he descended the stairs, and heard the conversation between Joe and Ford before he reached the kitchen.

"Ford, there's a killer out there, we don't need something to happen to Dipper, too." Joe's voice came as Stan came into the kitchen.

"You know he can take care of himself." Ford told him. "He's come out of four encounters with Bill -"

"This is different." Kristen cut him off. "He has a knife and...and he might have our little girl...If he got Dipper -"

"The boy'll be with us." Stan said, approaching them. "You know we'll keep him safe."

"How is he?" Ford asked carefully.

"I had to bribe him to get him to eat." Stan reported. "We'll have to get going as soon as he comes down."

"Stan, you didn't!" Kristen said, giving him a light scowl.

"Couldn't get him to eat, otherwise." Stan says. "Besides, I know how the kid feels. If we don't let him come with us, he'll go off on his own to find his sister. It's what twins do, trust me."

"We going?" Dipper's voice came. He had his backpack, which was no doubt filled with all manor of tools to take down anything that might have her. A short golf club and a mirror were sticking out it. Surely, the boy was prepared to fight for his sister.

"Someone's prepared for the worst." Ford said as he stood up and handed Stan his keys. "Atta boy."

As the car rode down the streets, Dipper's eyes scanned the town like a radar. Ford looked at him worriedly. He sighed. "We get it, Dipper."

"Actually, you don't, not really." Stan said. If not for how matter-of-fact his voice was, Ford might have felt like he was just picking a fight, and it made him curious.

"What do you mean?" Ford asked. "When I whipped your memory –"

"I was still right in front of you the whole time." Stan interrupted. "I spent thirty years fixing your portal and...I didn't even know if you were alive." Ford's eyes widened. He'd never considered the possibility that Stan had been worried about him apart from feeling guilty. He looked at Dipper through the rear-view mirror with his own new-found worry; the last time Ford didn't know where Stan was, he was still blinded by his bitterness and probably wouldn't have cared to hear that his brother was dead. Stan was right, he couldn't imagine it.

The rest of the ride was made in silence before Stan had to pull into a gas station. After filling up the tank, Dipper suddenly got out of the car, startling his uncles.

"Dipper?" Stan asked as he and Ford got out to see what was going on.

"This is taking forever." Dipper said. "I'm going on foot, maybe we can cover more ground."

"Dipper, wait." Ford said. "We promised your parents that we'd keep you safe. I'm coming with you."

"You two go look on foot." Stan said, getting back in the car. "I'll keep searchin' the roads." Stan pulled out and got back onto the road and Dipper and Ford were quiet as they took off themselves. It started snowing as they walked down the sidewalk.

"Dipper!" Dipper stopped and turned around to be embraced by Pacifica. As he inhaled the flowery scent of her hair, he saw Robbie and Gideon running up to them from behind her.

"See, he's still here." Robbie said.

"Weird." Gideon said as they caught up to them. "If my peach is gone, why is Dipper –"

"Gideon, we're normal twins, not conjoined or telepathic." Dipper said as Pacifica let go of him.

"Yeah, but you know her better than anyone, right?" Robbie asked.

"I like to think so." Dipper said.

"Oh, we're wastin' time!" Gideon suddenly yelled, spooking everyone, and starting to run ahead of the group.

"Gideon!" Pacifica called, pulling him back by the back of his shirt as he passed her. "We're trying to find her, not scare her away!"

"And just to be clear, you said you'd try to get over her and this whole thing seems to be going against that." Dipper added.

"Yeah, but she's missin' and I'm-I'm...worried." Gideon said and the way his eyes darted from side to side it was clear that he wasn't being completely honest.

"We're all worried," Ford said, "but the kid's right. We're not helping Mabel by just standing around. Let's get going again." So they continued in their small group, Gideon breaking the silence after a while.

"So who's this old man again?" he asked.

"My great-uncle Ford." Dipper said. "He's Stan's brother."

"Stanford has a brother?" Gideon asked.

"No, that's Stanford, Stan's real name is Stanley." Dipper explained. "See, Ford got sucked into this portal thirty two years ago, and Stan felt like Ford was worth more than him or something, so he took Ford's identity and faked his own death in a car crash, so to everyone else Stanley was dead and Stanford was still around."

"Well, my head hurts." Robbie commented. All the public really knew about the whole thing was that Stan was living under his missing brother's name until he showed back up, but no one had known anything about a portal or a car crash.

"Their whole family is full of surprises." Pacifica said.

"Oh, and he's also the one that wrote the journals." Dipper said.

"The journals?" Gideon asked, his eyes widening. "He wrote the journals?"

"Later, okay, kids?" Ford said in something of a dismissive tone.

"Tch." Robbie scoffed. "Surprises. How come my parents can't even be interesting when friends of a friend were leading these insane lives before they even reached thirteen."

"Dipper." Pacifica said. "He's always snooping around in places, and it makes him a magnate for weirdness."

"Hey!" Dipper protested.

"Tell me I'm wrong!" Pacifica challenged.

"Can we just focus on -" Dipper started, but stopped.

"What is it?" Gideon asked.

"Shhh!" Dipper hissed. He heard a voice that sounded like Mabel's. He couldn't make out what she was saying, but he was sure it was her. But...what if it wasn't?

"You guys stay here." he said as he took off his backpack and found a flashlight. "If this isn't what I think it is, I don't want anyone else to get hurt."

"Dipper, what's going on?" Ford asked as Dipper clicked on the flashlight and ran into a brick tunnel he had only recently began noticing – it must have been new.

"Just stay there!" Dipper called as he disappeared from sight. He followed Mabel's voice down the tunnel, hearing it grow louder and louder within a minute. His heart lifted when he saw her and he ran to her with his arms out, ready to embrace her and beg her forgiveness for that stupid fight.

Dipper stopped, taking in her unusual behavior. If he knew her, and he certainly did, she should have been running to him with a huge smile. However, Mabel was walking towards him slowly, and as she got closer, he noticed her smirk. What made him stop, though, was her eyes. They...they looked like Bill, but different. Rather than yellow, her eyes were completely green and the pupils were Xs.

"Hello, brother." Mabel's voice was low and snake-like as she stopped in front of him. His eyes lingered for a moment on what she had in her hand – a switchblade.

"Who are you?" Dipper asked warily, watching his sister suspiciously.

Mabel raised her eyebrows at him, impressed that he wasn't fooled. "Very well, than. My name is Reat, and your sister was kind enough to lend me this body."

"You're a liar." He whispered, now glaring at her. Reat laughed.

"Clever boy." she said. "I have to say, it was quite the toss-up between her and your blond friend, but in the end, her guilt was far fresher."

"And I take it you're from the Nightmare Realm? Same as Bill?" Dipper asked, and received a response he did not expect as Reat's eyes flashed angrily.

"Bill was weak!" she spat. "No self-respecting demon would repeat their own mistakes. He asked for what he got. Underestimating the bonds between siblings for a third time, even with a setup. Tch! How sloppy."

"Okay, Reat. What do you want?" Dipper asked.

"As simple as Bill was, he was an old friend of mine." Reat said in an almost bored tone. "You meat-sacks need to learn your place, and I won't make his mistakes. I am fully aware of how powerful your silly little human bonds are, and am quite prepared to use that strength to my ends." Dipper started towards her, and Reat unsheathed and rose the switchblade to Mabel's throat. Dipper froze and Reat looked dead serious. "Here's the thing, dear boy, I've already told you that I've been watching your blond friend for a while. This body is really no use to me, if she died I could always leave while she bleeds out to look for a new host. You, however, need her badly. So unless who want this blade to kill her, you will back away."

Feeling trapped, he did the only safe option he saw; he complied. Reat smiled at him as he backed up. As she turned and walked back the way she came. Not knowing what more he could do, Dipper watched her before turning around and running back out of the tunnel.

"Fooord! Staaan!" he called, feeling completely helpless.

* * *

Regrettably, this is going to be a brief arc, which is too bad because the more I figure Reat out, the more awesome she becomes. I just can't think of any reason Dipper would slack off here with his sister's life in the balance. Review.

19-16-5-3-20-18-1 9-19 2-5-19-20-18-1

 **Hint** : Match numbers to letters


	26. Shades Of Gray

**Chapter Twenty-four: Shades Of Gray**

"So this thing says that it can just do anything with her?" Soos asked Dipper fearfully. They, Robbie, Wendy, Pacifica, Gideon and McGucket were sitting around the still lavish dinning room table at the mansion. At the moment, Ford was in his study working on something or other and Stan was calling Dipper and Mabel's parents to fill them in on things.

"Yeah, that's why we need to get rid of it fast." Dipper said. "Ford says whatever he's working on might do something."

"So why are we just sitting here?" Robbie asked impatiently.

"Dipper, didn't you say that Bill possessed you once?" Gideon asked. "How did you best him than?"

"Mabel, uh...beat him out of me." Dipper said, feeling very uncomfortable at the idea of actually deliberately hurting his sister. The others were also visibly uncomfortable. "That won't work, though. Reat said that she didn't need Mabel, and if she lost her body, she could just find another one."

"But if she's using her body as a bargaining chip, doesn't she need it for that?" Pacifica asked. For a third or forth time, Dipper considered telling her that she was Reat's backup plan, and for a third or forth time he decided that there was no point in scaring her like that. Before he could answer her, there was the loud sound of shattering glass from a nearby room. Dipper immediately went to investigate, closely followed by the others.

In a room not far down the hall, the floor was littered with broken glass, the large window to the outside shattered. The rest of the room was completely in tact and there was no sign of any attempted crime such as burglary. However, there was a note hanging from a large shard jutting up from the frame. Dipper was careful to keep his footing as he stepped on the smaller shards, all the while feeling grateful for his shoes on his way to the window. He tore the note from the shard and read the few words on the page. Immediately he recognized the same signature that punctuated the note he had back home; the same D with a P inside it. His blood ran cold.

 _I heard everything. I'm on your side. More than you know._

"Kids!" Stan's voice called, and he and Ford appeared in the doorway in something of a panic.

"We heard something break." Ford said, his and Stan's eyes honing in on their nephew standing among what must have been yards worth of broken glass. "Is anyone hurt?"

"No, but we found this." Dipper said, holding the note up for the others to see.

"Be careful!" Stan warned as Dipper made his way back to the group, he taping his toes on the floor to free any shards from them. He handed Stan the note and he and Ford skimmed it in seconds.

"It's the same person who killed that gnome." Dipper said.

"Well, it doesn't sound like he has anything to do with this, so that's a relief." Stan said and looked over at Ford. "Are the specs ready?"

"Just finished them." Ford said, holding up a pair of odd-looking glasses; a pair of wooden triangles with dark circle lends in the centers. He handed them to Dipper. "Put these on and you'll be able to see a person's aura. Something from the Nightmare Realm would have a powerful aura which would be incredibly noticeable even from a distance. If nothing else, it's an advantage to know where Reat is."

"Thanks, Ford." Dipper said and slipped them on. He was immediately greeted by a surprising sight. There was a grayish aura around everyone present, and the next thing he noticed as that there were different shades of gray. For instance, Wendy had a loos, silvery fog around her where Stan 's aura was thicker and darker. Dipper practically jumped when he turned to a mirror and saw the gray aura around himself.

"Dipper?" Ford asked as Dipper took the glasses off. "What did you see?"

"There's this gray aura." Dipper explained slowly, seeming to be a bit dazed. "It's around all of us."

"Gray?" Stan asked. "Ain't auras supposed to be, like, red, blue or something?"

"Usually." Ford said. "Gray auras aren't impossible, but for all of us to have it...I think something's wrong. How about you go outside with those things and check other people's auras while you look for Reat, just to make sure they work properly. We'll clean up here."

"Sure." Dipper nodded and put them back on.

"So what makes you think she'd be here?" Wendy asked as they looked out at the lake. Mabel loved the lake, but she was possessed by something.

"Nothing, but it's at least a place to start." Dipper retorted. He had kept an eye on everyone with the glasses on, and he had noted that everyone had different colored auras, but the six of them still had the same varying shades of gray. He'd have to remember to take this up with Ford later.

"So who was that letter from?" Pacifica asked as Dipper scanned the area with the glasses.

"The guy who murdered that gnome a few weeks ago." he answered in a voice that seemed too casual to be talking about a murder.

"What did he want?" Wendy asked uncertainly.

"He said he was on our side." Dipper said.

"We don't need a murderer's help." Robbie scoffed lazily.

"What're we gonna do, than?" Wendy pressed.

"I-I don't know." Dipper stuttered, frowning behind the glasses as they continued walking. He stopped as a powerful aura was picked up by the glasses and looked around alertly. Whatever it was, it was running away quickly, or so he figured considering how the aura was quickly fading.

"You see anything?" Robbie asked.

"No." Dipper lied absently. "Reat...Reat wants to avenge Bill."

"So none of us are safe?" Gideon asked, his voice trembling.

"Oh no." A new voice said, startling everyone. Behind them was Mabel, but her eyes were strange – it must have been Reat. "The five of you are quite safe – at least, should everything go according to plan." her demonic gaze lingered on Pacifica, sending chills up the girl's spine. Dipper rushed to stand between them, glaring at Reat. The deep green aura around her prompted him to lift the glasses from his eyes, setting them on his head.

Reat inhaled deeply as though taking in a wonderful scent. She must have inhaled something, because the green of her eyes pulsed and brightened. "Oh, that's good!" she breathed in blissfully. "Your doubt. Your misery, it's delicious!"

Dipper's eyes widened as he put the pieces together. "You feed off of negative emotions." he spoke with a kind of wistful clarity. Reat nodded.

"Hm." Reat pondered. "You're not as stupid as you look. Shame you are still as helpless as you look. As I've already said, I can afford to get rid of this body – you can't. Or won't, whichever."

"How did you even come across Mabel? What negative emotions can she have?" Dipper demanded.

"Ironic, isn't it?" Reat cooed sarcastically. "So blind to your dear sister's plight, when she thinks she's the inconsiderate sibling."

"That again?" Dipper asked. "We already cleared that up months ago. Tell me the truth, Reat!" He was shouting now.

"I just did." Reat said. "If you choose not to see it, that's your affair. In the meantime..." Reat reached onto Mable's pocket and pulled out a pocket knife. Everyone's blood ran cold as she unsheathed the thing and brought it to Mabel's throat.

"No!" several of them yelled in a panic, Dipper charging forward.

"Freeze!" Reat barked, pressing the blade into her throat, hard enough to make a momentary impression in the skin but not hard enough to draw blood. Dipper stopped, watching with wide, terrified eyes. The silence was maddening before Reat spoke, talking clearly and slowly as though to a child in trouble. "This is my revenge. Getting powerful off of the misery of the very beings who destroyed Bill. All the while, you are all totally helpless. Nothing you can do without hurting your precious sister. Farewell," Reat turned around to walk away, but looked back at the stunned group, giving them a nasty grin. "Pine Tree."

Reat's eyes pulsed, glowing an even brighter green as she levitated off of the ground, and flew out of sight. Dipper dropped to his knees, finding himself unable to talk. Tears had started rolling down his face during Reat's speech.

"Dipper?" It was Wendy's voice. She approached him quietly, kneeled down beside him and placed a hand on his back. She spoke softly. "We need to get back to the mansion. There's no use staying here."

She was right.. Having nothing else they could do, the kids returned to the mansion without speaking. After Dipper dazedly reported his finding about the shades to Ford, he walked into the dinning room to see Stan, Wendy, Pacifica and Robbie sitting around an end of the long table. The shades remained on his head, as Dipper had agreed to continue this experiment. As he approached the others, he caught their conversation.

"Didn't you say that guy who killed the gnome." Stan asked as Dipper sat down and felt a rush of fatigue from it. It was as if the day's strain was catching up with him, though he had no idea how he'd ever be able to sleep.

"He's still a murderer." Pacifica said. "How can we trust a monster like that?"

"Speaking of monsters," Wendy began, looking around them and seeing only Dipper, Robbie and Pacifica around her. "where's Gideon?"

At the same time, Gideon was back in his room having slipped away from the group. He was packing his backpack furiously, shoving thing after thing into it roughly. When there was not an ounce of space left, he forced the zipper shut – it was at times like this he wished he still has his amulet.

"If know-one will help me, than I'll save her myself!" he muttered angrily to himself, yanking the thing only his back, and marched out of the room, slamming the door. "I'll find that demon and somehow I'll...I'll get rid of her."

Back at the mansion, Robbie shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe the kid called it a day. It is getting kind of late."

"Maybe it is time to get home." Stan said and turned to Dipper. "Your folks'll probably flip out if you don't get home soon, kid."

"Yeah." Dipper said, fighting back a yawn.

"Okay, lets just meet up here first thing tomorrow." Wendy said. "Nine sound good?"

"Sounds good." Pacifica said and the boys nodded.

More determined then ever to protect her from Reat, Dipper insisted on walking Pacifica home himself. They walked in silence, and perhaps that was a good thing. Walking up to her door at last, they turned to each other, neither knowing what to feel, let alone say. With their sister and friend in such danger, Pacifica hugged Dipper, sending goosebumps up the boy's back before he returned the embrace.

Dipper quickly got lost in their embrace, enough to drown out the sound of an opening door, and he was only yanked back down to reality by someone loudly clearing their throat. Preston was standing in the doorway, staring daggers at Dipper. In his abrupt jerk away from Pacifica, the shades fell down over his eyes. His goosebumps returned at what he saw. The aura around Preston was so black and thick, the man was barely visible through it. It was like ink was flouting and climbing over him.

Dipper shook his head and took the shades off, forcing himself to calm down. Preston maintained his stern look and Pacifica, who seemed to pick up on his change in mood, looked concerned. 

"Dipper, are you -" she began, but Dipper cut her off.

"I, uh...I gotta go!" the boy stammered, and Pacifica sent an accusatory glare to her father as Dipper ran home as fast as his feet would carry him.

* * *

I'm ba-aack! I feel a-failure, though. This was supposed to be an arc, but I can't think of anything believable that would stall this out. They have a way to find her, they have a big motivation to not kill time here, and Gravity Falls isn't a big town. I feel like I'll just wrap this up maybe in a couple more chapters, at least. I'm sorry, it's like all the ideas I had for this are being dominated by ideas for the third and forth arcs. Go figure. Again, I'm sorry but I consider it a serious rookie mistake to contrive artificial stupidity in the name of lengthening a plot. Review.

Ehe gniht tuoba sesnel si taht yeht syawla trotsid ytilaer.

 **Hint** : Backwords


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